


No Sincerer Love

by elizaye



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Case Fic, Conspiracy Theories, M/M, Paranoia, Pre-Series, Skinwalker, Thingstiel, Torture, tigerstiel
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-08
Updated: 2014-01-23
Packaged: 2017-12-22 19:10:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 40,277
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/916977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elizaye/pseuds/elizaye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eighteen years ago, a demon killed Mary Winchester. About two years later, a rapid, inexplicable upsurge in the monster population exposed the world of the supernatural to the general public. Governments around the world took action, recruiting hunters to defend their people from this new threat. Less than a year after that, a young scientific genius named Carver Edlund developed the companion, a new race of skinwalker that was compliant, subservient to hunters. Armed with government sponsorship and these new companions, hunters were able to drive the population of monsters down considerably.</p><p>Now, fourteen years later, Dean is hunting solo, unregistered with the U.S. government because John is a paranoid son of a bitch who sees demonic influence everywhere he looks. After a mishap that nearly costs Dean his life, John forces him to take on a companion. While Dean and his companion get to know each other, they stumble upon some nasty government secrets that are difficult to swallow because they prove that there may be more to John's suspicions than meets the eye. After all, most conspiracy theories have some basis in fact, don't they?</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm 99% positive this fic is going to be updated at a much slower rate than the a/b/o and fem!Cas fics, so.. fair warning. Also I don't actually know if anything explicit will happen in this fic (as in, I don't have any plans for it at this moment), but I will change the rating if it becomes necessary.

—     _Oh, the tiger will love you. There is no sincerer love than the love of food._ —

—     _George Bernard Shaw_ —

* * *

Some people say that when you’re about to die, your whole life flashes before your eyes.

Yeah, that’s a load o’ crap, because the last thing Dean sees when he’s about to die is the pair of wide, sickly-yellow eyes of the spirit he’s supposed to be hunting.

And then it’s over.

* * *

Dean wakes up disoriented. The sky’s this odd, pinkish color, and his head hurts like hell. He sits up, and every muscle in his body screams in protest.

And then he remembers the hunt, the spirit, the grave he’d just finished digging. He scrambles to his feet and sees that he’s right by the grave, staring down at a caved-in coffin and a set of old bones. How is he still alive? The spirit should’ve killed him while he was knocked out, or at least dragged him away.

Dean looks around and sees that the sky’s the color that it is because the sun is rising, so he doesn’t waste any time, grabbing the salt and gasoline and getting right to work.

When the bones have gone up in flames, Dean rushes off to the car. Usually they fill in the grave to make their work a little harder to notice, but it’s too bright out now, and he could easily be spotted. It’s not exactly a crime to salt and burn some bones, but Dean doesn’t have a license, and that means he could be locked up for a year or two. And man, would that piss Dad off.

So Dean gets in the Impala and beats it, packs up everything at the motel and hurries off toward Flagstaff, where he’s supposed to be rendezvousing with Dad in a few hours.

Dad’s pissed when Dean gets there, four hours late. “What kept you? I told you to be here _on time_.”

“Sorry, sir,” Dean says. “There was a uh, a complication.”

Dad’s eyes narrow. “What kind of complication? You told me it was a routine salt-an’-burn.”

“Well… yeah. The bitch must’ve been tethered to her bones a bit better than usual. I was about to light ‘er up, but she showed up and knocked me out.”

“Knocked you out?” Dad says, and his voice carries a note of worry, something Dean isn’t used to hearing from him. “How did it knock you out? Didn’t you have your shotgun with you?” When Dean shakes his head, Dad’s words turn angry. “How could you be so careless? You could have _died_.”

“I know, I know. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry? Sorry isn’t gonna cut it, son.”

“What do you want from me, then? I’m alive, aren’t I?”

“Don’t take that tone with me.”

Dean clenches his jaw. “Sorry.” Dad raises an eyebrow, and Dean adds belatedly, “Sir.”

Dad nods slowly, but his face is stern, impassive. This is far from over.

“So uh… did you have a hunt for me?” Dean asks when Dad remains silent.

“I did.”

“Oh, come _on_. You’re not holding back just because I accidentally—you’ve gotta be kidding me.”

“If you’re capable of making such a rookie mistake once, there’s no telling whether or not you’ll make it again,” Dad says. “Hell, you could have even made the same mistake a few times before and just gotten lucky. I don’t want to risk you dying because you’re an idiot.”

“Okay, _sorry_. I’ll be careful. I’ll double-check everything all the time. Will you just—”

Dad shakes his head. “No, I… give Caleb a call. Tell him to check out some disappearances in Omaha. I’m gonna call a friend.”

“Omaha? Dad, I could—”

“Call Caleb,” Dad insists, the tone of his voice brooking no argument. Then he gets to his feet and leaves the motel room, pulling his cell phone out as he walks through the doorway.

Dean grumbles nonsensically, sits down on the bed, and takes out his own cell phone, scrolling through the contacts until he gets to Caleb. The phone call is short—Caleb lives in Lincoln, so it’ll only take him about an hour to get to Omaha and check things out.

After hanging up, Dean sighs and tosses his phone on the bed beside him. He’s been hunting on his own for almost a whole year, and he’s been doing great. And then he makes one mistake— _one_ mistake—and Dad goes back to looking at him like he’s a ten-year-old who’s just learned how to fire a shotgun and can’t be trusted with the damn thing.

He curses himself for his carelessness, because if he’d taken the time to grab his shotgun, everything would be fine, and Dad wouldn’t be passing this hunt on to Caleb instead of Dean.

A few minutes later, Dad comes back in. “You’re making a trip to Wisconsin.”

Dean frowns up at him. “Okay, why? It can’t be a hunt, because you’re apparently not coming with.”

“I have a job to finish here,” Dad says.

“Still doesn’t answer my question. Sir.”

“You’re going to visit Dr. Carver Edlund.”

“Carver—oh, fuck,” Dean groans as he recognizes the name, ignoring the way Dad lifts an eyebrow at him. “You can’t be serious. You’re making me get a companion?”

“Yes.”

“I thought you were the one who said that using a supernatural creature to hunt supernatural creatures was stupid and hypocritical and—didn’t you say that only idiots would trust them?”

“You know that’s not what I said,” Dad answers.

“Okay, so maybe you didn’t say all of that exactly, but… well, I don’t even have a license! And I know for sure you’re against licenses and all that tracker bullshit. I can’t get a companion without a license,” Dean reasons.

“You can from him.”

“He’s the lead scientist behind the companions,” Dean says, frowning. “How can he—”

“He owes me,” Dad says, and the tone of his voice means that Dean really shouldn’t press.

But of course, Dean does anyway. “Why?”

Dad gets this flinty look in his eyes and stalks past Dean to go through his bag. “Iron River is the name of the town you’ll be going to. Ask for Dr. Edlund, and if he won’t see you, tell the secretary your name is Dean Winchester.”

“Dad—”

“That’s an order.”

Dean clenches his jaw and tamps down his questions.

How could a government-employed scientist owe Dad anything? Why would Dad trust him enough to make Dean give up his real name? Dean knows how much Dad doesn’t trust the government these days, doesn’t trust the fact that in order to get a license to legally hunt the supernatural, people need to get trackers implanted into their forearms.

Dean’s read about the type of tracking device that they’re using. It’s supposedly a safety precaution, because aside from allowing the government to pinpoint location, it also monitors blood pressure, body temperature, and other life stats, so that if something goes wrong on a hunt, the nearest hunters can be notified to provide help.

It all sounds like good stuff to Dean, but Dad’s more than a little paranoid about this, and he won’t explain why. Dean is absolutely sure that it has to do with the thing that killed Mom, but he can’t imagine how the government could possibly have been involved—it was just something like eighteen years ago, back when hunters were scarce, and the general population didn’t even know about the supernatural. All Dean knows is that he can’t have a tracker implanted, which means he can’t legally hunt, yet Dad wants him to do it anyway.

And now he’s supposed to get a companion without a tracker, which should technically be impossible.

“Dad, I really don’t think this is a good idea,” Dean says.

“You questioning me, now?”

“It’s just that—”

“Dean, when I give you an order, you obey. It’s that simple. Or do you not trust me anymore?”

“Of course I trust you, Dad.”

“Then you’ll do as I say and go to Dr. Edlund.”

“Yes, sir,” Dean says as evenly as he can, but it’s impossible to keep the anger out of his tone. He’s not stupid, and he’s not a child anymore. He actually _can_ process information in his own head.

Then Dad says in a softer voice, “Dean, this is for your own good.”

Dean looks up to see Dad’s eyes fixed on the wall, because Dad is terrible with this sort of stuff. Dean can probably count on his fingers the number of times Dad has tried to comfort him.

“I don’t like these companions very much,” Dad continues, “but I have to admit that they’re effective. I’ve seen the death rates, before and after the companions were developed and made available, and they get the job done. Maybe a time will come when we won’t need them anymore, and we’ll be able to get rid of them. But until that time comes…” he shakes his head, sighs. “You shouldn’t be out there alone, Dean. If Sam would hunt…”

Dad stops himself there, and Dean says, “It’s okay, Dad. I get it. You want me to have someone watching my back, and if you and Sam can’t do it, then that’s the next best option.”

It still doesn’t explain how Dad expects him to get a companion without a tracker, but Dad’s given a lot of ground today, more than he usually does, and Dean will respect his wishes. Hell, Dean almost always follows Dad’s orders, and it’s kept him alive this long, so he’s just gotta believe that this Edlund guy will be trustworthy.

“When should I leave?”

“How tired are you?”

“Uh, not very,” Dean answers—including the five-hour drive to Flagstaff, he’s only been awake about six hours since he woke up by the side of that grave.

“Leave now, then. It’s a long drive to Wisconsin.”

Dean nods and gets up. “All right. I’ll see you later then, Dad.”

“Good luck, son.”

* * *

It ends up taking Dean about a day and a half, with a break in the middle to catch some sleep, to get to Iron River. The town is a lot smaller than Dean had expected, especially since the creator of companions apparently carries out most of his experiments here. But the advantage of its small size is that Dean has no trouble at all locating the headquarters.

The building looks dingy and old from the front and, just like the town, is a whole lot smaller than Dean thought it would be.

“With all the crap they say about safety, you’d think they’d spend a bit more money on their facilities,” Dean mutters as he gets out of the car.

He goes in through the front door and sees a small lobby, empty except for a young woman sitting behind a desk.

“Hello,” she says with a smile. “Do you have an appointment?”

Dean chuckles and makes a show of looking around. “Do I really need one?”

“Dr. Edlund is a very busy man,” the woman says. “He doesn’t have time for walk-ins.”

“Uh, right. Well, could you tell him that Dean Winchester is here to see him?”

“Right,” she scoffs. “Because your _name_ will be enough to get him to see you.”

“Lady—”

“Dr. Edlund is running a series of very important experiments this week, and he really doesn’t have free time to—”

“ _Hey_ ,” Dean says, cutting her off. “Just tell him I’m here. That’s all. If he says he won’t see me, I’ll be outta your hair in no time.”

He forces a smile, and the girl sighs, looking at him like he’s the biggest pain in the ass, but she picks up the phone on her desk and dials a four-digit extension, so Dean maintains that fake-ass grin for another moment before letting it fade.

“Hi, Dr. Edlund? Sorry to bother you, but—yes, I know you’re busy. There’s this guy here, says that you’ll see him if I tell you his name.”

Dean can’t stop himself from rolling his eyes, because the sooner she gets on with it, the sooner he can get outta this middle-o’-nowhere town.

“Dean Winchester,” the secretary says, glancing up at Dean for confirmation. “Oh. Uh, yes. Okay. I’ll tell him. Bye.” She puts the phone back on the receiver.

“What’s the verdict?” Dean says.

“He’ll be right over,” she answers.

If Dean were a better person, he wouldn’t say anything, but he’s never thought of himself as a good person. “Well, was that so hard?”

She shoots him a dirty look but says nothing and turns her attention back to her computer monitor. Dean can’t see what she’s doing, so he moves over to one of the many vacant chairs and sits down.

Three minutes later, a short, harried-looking guy in a dirty, once-white lab coat comes rushing in. It looks like his chin has accumulated a few days’ worth of scruff, and his hair is just long enough that it looks tangled, like it could use some brushing. But he’s young, a lot younger than Dean had expected for the guy who’s supposed to have come up with the first companions.

“Dean, right?” the man—must be Dr. Edlund—says as Dean gets to his feet. He sticks a hand out for Dean to shake and continues without giving Dean time to answer, “I uh, I thought you wouldn’t be here for another day or two. Weren’t you just in Flagstaff?”

Dean shakes his hand and answers, “Didn’t wanna waste any time. So you got anything for me?”

“Of course. Follow me,” Dr. Edlund says. He spins and walks back the way he came, and Dean hurries to keep up.

They walk back past the desk and through a door that opens into a narrow hallway. Dr. Edlund walks quickly, and even though Dean’s about a head taller than him, it’s almost hard to keep pace.

“So uh, what’s the deal with this place?” Dean asks.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I don’t mean any disrespect, Dr. Edlund, but—”

The doctor laughs. “Dean, don’t call me that. Didn’t your dad tell you anything?”

Dean frowns, because he doesn’t want to admit anything to this stranger, whether or not Dad seems to trust him.

“Call me Chuck,” the doctor says when Dean doesn’t answer. “Carver Edlund’s just a name I made up.”

“Oh. Why?”

Chuck shrugs, still maintaining the same pace. “I uh, I wasn’t always a doctor. I mean, I don’t even have an actual doctorate.” Dean stares as the man starts getting flustered, but he eventually gathers himself and says, “If it weren’t for your dad… let’s just say that Carver Edlund never would’ve existed.”

“Huh,” Dean says. “So I’m guessing he saved your ass a while back.”

“Yep. Yep, that he did.”

They reach a door at the end of the hallway, and Chuck produces a keycard from his pocket. It slides open at his command, and they step into a large laboratory. Dean scans the room quickly, but Chuck just heads to the right, and Dean jogs a few steps to catch up.

“What’s the story, then?” he asks.

“Oh. Well, uh,” Chuck pauses to open another door and steps through into another hallway, this one shorter than the last, “it was a shapeshifter. The thing killed my agent and—”

“Your agent?”

“Right,” Chuck says, and Dean catches a dull flush rising on the back of Chuck’s neck. “I was a uh, a pulp fiction writer?” he says, voice lilting up at the end so that it sounds like a question. “Anyway, the shapeshifter killed Becky and took her place, and it was gonna kill me next, but your dad came, shot it with a silver bullet, and that was the end of it.”

“Okay, and how does ‘Carver Edlund’ figure into any of this, then?”

They stop at the end of this hallway. “Well, I was a biology major. Huge into genetics, and did a fair share of research back in college. When I found out about shapeshifters, I asked your dad for more information about the supernatural, and well… one thing led to another, but eventually he was catching skinwalkers for me.”

Dean nods—everyone knows that the first companions were created by breeding skinwalkers with other types of animals, starting with already domesticated species to hopefully make them more docile. Controllable. It’s probably only been a little over a decade since the first companions were made, but the knowledge in the field has already expanded to the point that companions are genetically engineered to be submissive.

“Anyway, uh. You got any specific species in mind?” Chuck asks, because after obedience was taken care of, species became just a detail—hunters could request skinwalkers of any species, from dogs and cats to birds and reptiles. Dean’s even heard of a hunter who had a friggin’ _flying squirrel_ for a companion..

“Nope.”

“All right, then.” Chuck moves to press his keycard to the pad beside this door, but Dean grabs his hand, stopping him.

“Just—one thing,” he says. “I’m not… registered.”

Chuck blinks at him before breaking into a wide smile and shaking his head. “Your dad really told you _nothing_. Wow. I guess—yeah, that sounds like your dad. Uh, that’s no problem. Your dad saved my life, and he was an unregistered hunter. If he doesn’t want the government to put a tracker in you or your companion, that’s fine by me.”

“Chuck, you don’t by any chance happen to know why exactly my dad…”

“…is such a paranoid guy?” Chuck finishes. “Not the faintest.” After a pause, Chuck says, “So you ready to take a look?”

Dean nods and tries to muster up a bit more enthusiasm. He just doesn’t like the idea that Dad thinks he needs a freaking _guardian_ to watch over him. Because sure, they’re called companions, but hell, most of the companions Dean’s seen are pretty much guard dogs—or cats, rather. Felines are more popular than canines because they’re supposedly quieter on the job.

Chuck pushes the door open and leads them into a room that’s completely empty of any furnishing or decoration. One wall is made completely of glass, and behind it is a huge room filled with animals—some winged, some not, but all obviously companions—making it clear that this is a viewing room. Dean is surprised that he didn’t see it from outside, because this enclosure looks freaking state-of-the-art.

Dean’s only been in the viewing room for about five seconds when he spots it and just _knows_ that if he’s gotta have one of these stupid _companions_ , it’ll be that one. The creature is standing at the far end of the pen, a massive tiger with vibrant, red-orange fur striped with lines of pitch-black. It turns its head in the direction of the viewing pen for a moment before turning away and prowling along the far end of its prison, but in that brief moment Dean’s able to catch that its eyes are impossibly blue.

Dean starts paying attention and realizes that Chuck’s been talking while he was staring at the tiger, something about which types of creatures that are good for particular types of hunts. Dean didn’t even know that the types of hunts would factor into his decision.

“I want the tiger,” Dean says, cutting the man off.

Chuck huffs a laugh. “Well, of course you want him. Everyone does.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“He’s beautiful,” Chuck says, looking at Dean like he’s an idiot. “I mean, just look at that coat. Who wouldn’t want him? But uh, there’s something different about him. I’m still trying to figure out what went wrong.”

“What’s so different about him?” Dean asks.

Chuck glances at Dean. “Have you seen companions before?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“And how would you describe them around their owners?”

Dean shrugs. “Obedient. Quiet.”

“Right. But this tiger won’t imprint on anyone. I tried to sell him off once even without imprinting because the guy offered such a high price, but he ran away and came right back here.”

“So he’s probably imprinted to you, then,” Dean says, and he can’t help or explain the low ache of disappointment in his chest.

But Chuck shakes his head. “Nope. Won’t listen to a thing I say. He won’t even change back to his human form so that we can have a proper conversation. I’ve tried talking to him before, but… well. I haven’t seen him in human form since he was maybe three months old.”

Dean frowns. Figures that the only one he’s interested in would be dysfunctional. He opens his mouth to speak, but suddenly huge, ebony wings are unfurling from the air above the tiger, wings that Dean somehow hadn’t even noticed. He spares a glance at Chuck and sees that the scientist is smiling.

But Dean can’t keep his eyes from shifting right back to the tiger, watching as it takes off into the air with a few great flaps of its wings. He’s always known that feline companions are graceful on the ground, perfect for almost any sort of hunt, but he’s never felt like they’d look as good in flight. This tiger is proving him so wrong—even from so far away, he can see how its fur ripples as it flies, as though the stripes on its back are shifting, changing patterns. The smaller companions stay out of its way as it makes a circuit around the top of the glass dome.

Then it’s coming back down, and Chuck says in a reverent voice, “He hasn’t done that in a long time. Beautiful wings, though.”

“Yeah,” is all Dean can think to say.

And then the tiger is landing a few yards away from the glass wall, staring right at them. It folds its wings at its back, and when Dean blinks, they’re gone.

“W-What—” Dean begins.

“Like I said. Different,” Chuck says, but he sounds smug now. The tiger approaches the glass and places a giant paw on it.

“What is he doing?”

“I like to think it’s his way of saying hi. It definitely doesn’t happen often,” Chuck says with a small smile. Then he side-eyes Dean again. “It’s never happened with a stranger around, come to think of it. I always thought Cas was too shy.”

“Cas?”

“Oh, yeah,” Chuck says, cheeks flushing. “I uh, I normally don’t name companions because it’s supposed to be the owner’s right, but I figured… since Cas wasn’t imprinting on anyone, and he seems to like it enough…” Chuck breaks off into a nervous laugh.

Dean looks back to see that the tiger is focused on him now, large, blue eyes fixed on him unblinkingly. “Shit,” he breathes, surprised.

“Wow,” Chuck says, and his voice sounds a little shaky. “This uh, this hasn’t ever happened before. You… wanna meet him?”

“Are you kidding me? Of course I do.”

Chuck takes a deep breath and holds his keycard to a side door that Dean hadn’t noticed when he stepped into the viewing room. “Okay, then. I’ll see if I can get him out. Just uh, stay here.” The doctor exits the room, and the door swings shut behind him.

When Dean turns his attention back to the cage, he notes that the tiger—Cas—is turning to the side. Chuck enters Dean’s field of vision, making shooing gestures at these two domestic-looking ginger cats that are weaving around his legs. Dean doesn’t bother holding back his laugh, and judging from Chuck’s lack of reaction, the scientist can’t hear him.

The cats eventually get the point and scamper off together, and Chuck starts to beckon Cas to come closer, but he doesn’t get a reaction. Dean steps closer to the glass, and even though he can’t hear anything, he’s amused by the way Chuck is pleading with the big cat.

Finally, Chuck seems to get fed up and turns around, disappears from Dean’s sight. Dean looks back at Cas and is surprised to see that he’s moving in the same direction, following Chuck.

A minute later, Chuck opens the door a crack. “Promise me you’re not gonna freak out, okay? Because there was this time a guy said he wanted a lion, but as soon as he was in the same room with it, he freaked out, and the lion freaked out too, and it was just—”

“Dude. It’s fine,” Dean says. “I’m not gonna freak out.”

“Okay,” Chuck says. He pushes the door open and steps back into the viewing room.

Cas follows a few seconds later, taking slow, measured steps. His eyes—so blue, so, _so_ fucking blue—are trained on Dean, and Dean can’t look away. The tiger continues to advance, and Dean finds himself backing up without ever intending to do so.

“Uh, don’t startle him,” a voice—right, Chuck’s voice—says.

Dean’s back hits a wall, and Cas stops about a foot away from him, lifting his head so that their eye contact doesn’t break, and Jesus _Christ_ , does he ever _blink?_

Abruptly, Cas rears up, and Dean tries to shy away, except that he _can’t_ , because his back is already up against a wall, and holy shit, if this is how he dies, Dad is gonna be _pissed_. Two giant paws land against the wall on either side of Dean’s head, and Dean swallows hard, eyes still locked with Cas because maybe if he wins the staring contest, Cas won’t bite his head off.

“Just—just don’t make any sudden movements,” Chuck is saying in a panicked voice.

“I _wasn’t moving_ ,” Dean hisses back.

Cas leans in to sniff at Dean, giant blue eyes finally sliding shut, and Dean quickly turns his head to the side, away from the questing snout. Whiskers tickle his jaw, and then a wet nose comes into contact with his bared neck. Fuck, his life could end right this second. Then Cas makes this loud, rumbling sound that doesn’t seem at all threatening, pulls back, and drops down onto all fours again.

Dean lets out the breath he’s been holding, staring wide-eyed at Chuck. “What the hell just happened?”

Cas’s head is about level with Dean’s waist when he’s on the ground, and the tiger steps forward now, nudging at Dean’s hand. Chuck, meanwhile, looks pretty friggin’ clueless, for a professional.

But then he says, “Cas is… he’s _imprinting_ , Dean.”

“But I thought you said—”

“I know, but… you’ve obviously got his attention.”

Cas nudges Dean’s hand again, and Dean looks down at him. “What am I s’posed to do?” he asks Chuck.

“Pet him. If you want to keep him, you have to show him that you accept him.”

Dean nods, lifts his hand and runs it through the soft— _so_ soft, holy shit—fur on Cas’s head, and Cas makes that deep, growly sound again. And then Dean realizes what it is—fuck, the giant tiger is _purring_. Cas tilts his head into Dean’s touch.

“See if he’ll listen to you,” Chuck says.

“Uh, what do you want me to say?”

Chuck shrugs. “I don’t know. Give him a command.”

“Um. Cas, sit?” Dean says uncertainly.

Cas backs up a step and tilts his head up, and the look in his eyes clearly spells out, _You’re an idiot_.

“Okay, great. I’m pretty sure Cas thinks I’m a moron,” he says to Chuck before looking back down at Cas. “Aren’t you supposed to follow orders?”

Dean never knew tigers could arch their eyebrows, but apparently Cas has no problem with it, because he lifts one brow before slowly sitting down, tail flicking back and forth lazily.

“Oh, wow,” Chuck murmurs, and Dean glances over to see that the scientist looks freakin’ thrilled. “Tell him to take human form.”

At these words, Cas lets out a low warning growl.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Dean says.

“But he’s gonna have to be able to talk to you. I can’t let him go with you if you guys can’t communicate.”

Dean drops into a crouch, bringing himself to eye level with Cas, who stares levelly back at him. Dean has no clue what the tiger is thinking, but he’s pretty sure he sees something human in there, looking back at him defiantly. “I don’t know, Chuck. You said that you sold him to someone before,” Dean points out.

“Right.”

Dean tears his eyes away from Cas’s to look up at Chuck again. “What, is this different because I’m not paying you however much the other guy did?”

“No, no, it’s not that. I wouldn’t make you or your dad pay for anything. Without him, I’d be dead,” Chuck says hastily. “It’s just… Cas is finally responding, and I just…”

“You want to study him,” Dean says flatly.

“I… yeah,” Chuck admits. “He’s one-of-a-kind! I’ve never seen a companion like him before, and I’ve never been able to figure out what makes him different.”

“Maybe not every supernatural thing can be explained away by science,” Dean says.

“Yeah. Maybe,” Chuck says. He sighs. “All right, looks like he’s going with you. There’s a uh, two week period during which you can introduce your family to him. He’ll accept them and protect them as much as he’ll protect you.”

“Okay, and what if he doesn’t meet them in the first two weeks?”

“Then he won’t recognize them as family. They’ll be friends at best, so he won’t be obligated to protect them.”

Dean instantly starts mentally charting a course for Stanford. He’s in Wisconsin, so on the way he could stop by Bobby’s, and even the Roadhouse… “Is there a limit to the number of family members he’ll recognize?”

“The fewer the better, honestly,” Chuck says. “So don’t get any ideas about introducing all your friends as family. Otherwise the effect just gets sort of watered down.”

“Okay. Is that it?”

Chuck considers it for a moment. “Oh, I need to put a collar on him.”

Cas growls again, and Dean reaches out without thinking to soothe him. It’s only when his hand is already buried in the lush fur at the back of Cas’s neck that Dean realizes he just risked getting his hand bitten off by an angry tiger. But Cas arches into the contact, shifts to lay down on his belly.

“It’s the collar for a tracker,” Chuck explains when he sees that Cas is calm. “I won’t actually put a tracker in, but it’ll be extremely noticeable if you’re walking around with a collarless companion.”

“That sound okay to you, Cas?” Dean asks.

“Here, come with me. I’ll take you to get him a collar, and then you guys can head out,” Chuck says.

Dean follows Chuck out of the room, and Cas walks to his right, stays about half a step behind him. They go back through the lab that they’d passed by on the way in, but Chuck stops halfway down the first hallway and opens a door.

“Come in,” he says, and they enter a small room lined with cabinets on all the walls.

“Oh, god,” Dean can’t help muttering.

“Yeah, I know. It’s like Kamaji’s boiler room.”

“Uh.”

“Okay, never mind. You don’t look like you would’ve watched that movie,” Chuck says, looking embarrassed. He clears his throat. “Anyway, collar.” He moves across the room and tries a few drawers before opening one and letting out a sigh of relief. “Dean, come here and pick one.”

“Anything black is fine.”

“Okay, then.” Chuck takes out a nondescript black collar and passes it over to Dean. “You’re gonna have to put it on him yourself. I get this feeling he’d maul me if I tried.”

Dean turns back to Cas and sees that the tiger looks torn between bolting out of the room and standing his ground. Dean moves toward him slowly and takes a knee. Cas remains tense, eyes fixed on the collar. “You sure Cas didn’t suffer any abuse or something?” Dean asks. “I really don’t think this is something that’s just genetics.”

Chuck shakes his head. “No. He’s only left the facility that one time, and he came back pretty much the next day.”

Dean pets Cas with the hand that’s not holding the collar, and those bright, sapphire eyes finally shift away from the collar. “Hey,” Dean says, giving the tiger— _his_ tiger, now—a hopefully reassuring smile. “This is just a safety precaution. For me. If you don’t have one, I could get into some big trouble.”

The tiger’s eyes are doubtful, but his stance is much more relaxed, and he leans into Dean’s touch. Dean then holds the edge of the collar to Cas’s neck, making sure to move slowly so that his intent is clear. Cas eyes him warily but doesn’t move, holds still as Dean puts the leather around his neck and shifts forward so that he can clasp it.

As soon as the collar is in place, Cas shifts uncomfortably, growls low in his throat, and tosses his head. Dean pulls his hands back, holds them in front of himself with his palms facing out, waits for Cas to settle. The sound changes to something suspiciously like a whine, and then Cas is pressing the top of his head to Dean’s right palm.

“Wow,” Chuck breathes. “You’re a natural. There’s no way you’d stick around as an intern, is there?”

Dean huffs a laugh. “Nope, no way.” He rubs Cas’s head before getting to his feet and going back out into the hallway. Chuck follows, and Cas brings up the rear. “Thanks for everything,” Dean says as they go back out into the lobby.

“No, thank you for dropping by. And check in every now and then. I’d love to hear how Cas does out there,” Chuck says.

“Sure, sure,” Dean says, nodding.

Chuck smiles. “Good luck, Dean.”

Dean exits the building and walks toward the Impala, noting that the sky is a pinkish color—the sun is setting. He turns back to look at Cas and frowns. “Okay, I know you don’t wanna turn human, but this here’s my baby, and I don’t want you shedding all over her,” he says.

Cas just blinks up at him.

“You gonna shift or what?”

Nothing.

“Oh, you gotta be kiddin’ me,” Dean groans.

He unlocks the driver's door and goes to open one of the back doors for Cas, but when he turns, Cas’s huge wings have manifested again, and he looks like he’s ready to lift off.

“Wait— _hey_. Where do you think you’re going?”

Cas gives him the same look from before, when Dean had told him to sit, and Dean realizes that he intends to follow the car.

“Wings are friggin’ awesome,” he says, grinning, and Cas makes a huffing sound before taking off into the air.

Dean watches him fly for a moment, and it looks like he really enjoys the freedom. Then Dean gets into the Impala and drives off, checking for Cas every now and then.

He really is gonna have to figure out a way to convince Cas to shift though, because they’re gonna have to talk out loud at _some_ point… aren’t they?

* * *

It’s dark when Dean shows up on Bobby’s doorstep. “Hey yo, Bobby! Open up—it’s Dean!” he calls. He looks back and gestures for Cas to join him—the great tiger is still standing beside the Impala, looking around at all the junk cars mistrustfully.

Then the front door opens. “Dean,” he says, smiling warmly. “‘S been a long time since you last dropped by, boy. I was wonderin’ when I’d see ya again.”

“Well, I happened to be in the neighborhood, so I figured I’d stop by.”

“Come on in, then.”

Dean pauses, looks back at Cas, and says, “I uh, I’ve got a friend with me.”

Bobby follows his line of sight and whistles. “That a companion you got travelin’ with you, Dean?”

“Yep. I went and got myself one.”

Bobby frowns. “So I guess John finally cashed in on that favor with Chuck.”

Dean shrugs. “I don’t even know if it’d only be one favor,” he says. “From the way Chuck was talking, sounded like the guy thought he owed Dad everything.”

“Well, he wouldn’t be wrong,” Bobby answers. “Lotta people owe their lives to your daddy. ‘S nice to know some of them actually appreciate it.” After a pause, he says, “Well, what’re you waitin’ for? Bring it in. Might as well get it acquainted with Sharon, anyway.”

“Right,” Dean says, frowning at Cas as Bobby disappears into the house. “Cas, get over here,” he says.

The tiger turns to face him, eyes defiant. But before Dean can say anything else, Cas moves toward him, and he’s so graceful it looks like he’s not walking, but _gliding_. Cas walks past Dean and into the house, but he stiffens two steps into the living room.

“What?” Dean says, bumping into Cas when he enters. He pushes the door closed.

“It’s normal for companions to be uncomfortable in each other’s space when they first meet,” Bobby explains.

Dean nods. “Okay yeah, that makes sense.”

Then Sharon walks in—tall, with long, dark hair and glittering, green eyes—and it’s not often that Dean gets to see her in human form, so he smiles and gives a little wave.

“Dean,” Sharon says with a small smile. “It’s nice to see you again.”

“Yeah,” Dean agrees, and he notices that Cas is not-so-subtly staying in front of Dean, between him and Sharon, like he’s trying to _protect_ him, which—right, companion. Makes sense.

“Who is this?” Sharon asks, looking first at Cas, then at Dean.

“Dean got a companion,” Bobby answers.

Sharon frowns down at Cas. “He’s hostile. Wild, almost. Where did you find him?”

Dean looks over to Bobby, unsure what he’s supposed to say, but Bobby’s also looking at him, clearly interested. “I got him from Chuck, okay? The doc said he was different, but he imprinted on me, so I took him.”

Sharon reaches a hand up to her neck, and Dean notices the dark brown leather fitted snugly at the base. Without warning, she shifts, and Cas tenses up even more. When she’s done, there’s a good-sized—but small compared to Cas—black Rottweiler in her place. Dean will never get over the huge disconnect between the sleek, delicate look that Sharon maintains when she’s human and the rough look she takes on when she’s shifted.

She barks once at Cas, a short, yipping sound, and Cas lets out a low growl. Then Sharon’s moving toward Cas, and Bobby looks like he’s trying to hide his nerves.

“Sharon, easy,” he says.

Sharon ignores him and walks steadily until she’s right in front of Cas, and then she lies down on the ground, tilting her head up to look at him. Cas huffs out a short breath and bends to sniff at the Rottweiler, and Dean edges around his tiger to go stand by Bobby.

“Uh, so is that normal, too?” he asks.

Bobby shakes his head. “Nope. Usually they go human and talk these things out. What’s this Sharon’s saying about your companion being wild, Dean?”

“I just came from Chuck’s, I swear.”

Then Cas is in front of them, but his gaze is fixed on Bobby instead of Dean. He nudges at Bobby’s hand, and Dean recognizes the gesture.

“Uh, means you’re supposed to pet him,” he supplies.

Bobby looks distinctly uncomfortable, and Dean tries to focus on that instead of the irrational surge of jealousy that comes with the sight of Bobby’s hand running through Cas’s fur. Cas rumbles, making a sound that Dean now recognizes as pleased, and backs away, looking over to Sharon. She barks again and trots away. Cas takes a few steps in that direction, then turns his head back to look at Dean.

“Go on,” Dean says, and Cas follows Sharon out of the room.

“Well,” Bobby says, shaking his head. “Never thought I’d see a jungle cat in my living room. I don’t know about you, boy, but I need a drink.”

Dean laughs. “You know I’m always up for a beer,” he says, following Bobby into the kitchen.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As far as this fic is concerned, I am a horrible person, and I'm sorry about the lack of updates. I do intend to finish this fic eventually, and I have a rough idea of what direction I'll be taking it in, but it'll take some time because it's kind of the backburner fic that I work on when I don't have inspiration for my "main focus" fics.

Dean isn’t sure what time it is when he wakes up, but the house is silent. He’s not exactly comfortable—because let’s face it, bed are beds and couches are couches for a reason—but he’s ridiculously warm, warmer than he has any right to be, given that he’s using a thin jacket as a makeshift blanket. But then he looks to the side and sees the reason why it’s so toasty.

Beautiful tiger stripes fill his field of vision, and he blinks a few times, frowning—those weren’t there when he went to sleep. Dean reaches out, lightly brushes the fur with his fingertips. The wall of tiger fur is moving slightly, in a rhythm of deep, slow breaths that is absurdly hypnotic. Apparently, the couch is low enough to the ground that Cas, curled up, can press in nice and close to Dean. He’d gripe about his personal space, but the wall of soft fur is radiating heat, and he really can’t complain.

Dean yawns and sits up to stretch. It’s definitely morning now, if the sunlight pouring into the room is any sort of indicator. He looks over the giant mound of fur that is Cas and finds that Bobby and Sharon are nowhere to be seen.

“We probably oughta get going,” he mutters, more to himself than anything, because they’re on a deadline, and while it won’t take anywhere near two weeks to get to California, he’d still rather be safe than sorry.

Cas shifts at the sound of his voice, letting out a soft grunt before getting to his feet and stalking away. Frigid morning air rushes in to take his place, and Dean instantly misses the warmth. He shrugs off the sentiment, puts his jacket on, and is about to head upstairs to say goodbye to Bobby when he’s distracted by the way Cas is stretching, mouth wide open in a yawn. Wow, those teeth look sharp.

But then Cas is done, and he looks up at Dean expectantly before padding to the door and pressing a paw to it—claws retracted, thank god. If he damaged the surface, Dean would never hear the end of it.

“In a minute. I just have to say goodbye to Bobby, all right?”

He doesn’t think Cas will respond, but the tiger nods his head once, and Dean turns away, because that’s a really freakin’ weird sight.

Twenty minutes later, Dean is on the road again, looking out the window every now and then because he doesn’t have any way of knowing where Cas is while he’s in the air, and that bothers him a lot more than he’d expected it to.

Bobby had given him some advice about keeping companions before they parted to get some sleep last night. He told Dean that he should talk to Cas a lot, tell Cas what’s on his mind, spend time bonding with him. When Dean asked what Bobby did to bond with Sharon, he said that they had shot cans in the backyard. Sharon’s aim used to be shit, but she’s a crack shot now.

Dean had smiled at the thought and then realized that that wouldn’t work with Cas, so he’d said, _Well I can’t exactly shoot guns with a tiger, Bobby. What do you do when Sharon’s in her dog form?_

Bobby had mumbled something incomprehensibly, but when Dean pressed, Bobby finally grudgingly admitted that they played fetch a lot, and Dean hadn’t been able to suppress his laughter.

It was funny then, but thinking about it now…

Dean shakes his head. Fetch is absolutely out of the question. Cas already looked at him like he was an idiot when he tried to get Cas to ‘sit.’ What do tigers do for fun? Dean shudders as the answers occur to him—hunt, kill, and eat what they kill.

“Great. Perfect. Excellent choice, Dean. Choose the pretty tiger, that’s right,” he grumbles.

He changes the subject, because thinking about Cas is giving him a headache. He’s heading down to the Roadhouse, which is usually about a five-hour drive. Fantastic. He wonders where Dad is.

Just as the thought crosses his mind, his cell phone rings.

“Dean?” Dad says as soon as Dean picks up.

“Yeah.”

“How’d everything go? Did Chuck cooperate?”

“Yeah. Yeah, everything’s fine.”

After a pause, Dad asks, “So? Do you have a companion with you or what?”

“Yeah, I’ve got one. Chuck says I gotta introduce him to you and Sam before two weeks is up, so… wanna meet at Stanford?”

“Where are you?”

“I just left Bobby’s about… fifteen minutes ago? I’m on my way to Ellen’s, figured I’d stop by and let Cas meet some more friends.”

“I can be there by about ten o’clock tonight.”

“You don’t wanna go to Stanford and see Sam?” Dean asks.

“I don’t have time,” Dad answers curtly. “Wait at the Roadhouse. I’ll be there.”

“Yeah, okay. Bye, Dad.”

“Bye.”

Dean hangs up and drops his phone into the passenger seat.

Typical. Of course Dad’s still avoiding Sam, even though it’s obvious he forgave Sam a long time ago. Dean knows that Dad stops by every now and then to lurk around Stanford, check up on Sam. But Dad obviously doesn’t want Sam to know, and as much as Dean wants them to make nice again, he’s worried that if he tries to get them in the same room again, everything might explode in his face all over again.

Dean checks the time. It’s about eleven thirty, which means he has about ten and a half hours before Dad gets to the Roadhouse. It’ll take him just under five hours to get there from here, so he’s got about five and a half hours to kill…

After a few moments’ deliberation, Dean pulls over to the shoulder and cuts the engine. There aren’t any cars in sight, which is a bit odd, but he’s already far outside city limits, so less traffic is to be expected, he guesses. All around him is farmland, but one plot is barren, empty. He remembers reading some shit back in high school about farmland having to “lie fallow,” whatever that means.

And then it occurs to him that Cas is nowhere to be seen. Panic rises in his chest, sudden and urgent.

“Cas!” he bellows, spinning around and looking up. The sky is clear, crisp blue in every direction, not a cloud in sight, and Cas is just _gone_. “Cas, where the fuck are you?”

He doesn’t even know what he’s so worried about, but as he turns back to the Impala and crawls in to grab his phone from the passenger seat, he knows he hasn’t felt this worked up in a long time. His hands fumble with his pockets as he digs for the business card Chuck had given him—Dr. Carver Edlund is printed in glossy, gold letters, along with a phone number and address.

But before he can dial the number, something nudges his foot—it’s still hanging out of the car—and Dean looks back to see the giant tiger there, black wings still flared wide.

“Where the hell _were_ you?” Dean demands, throwing down phone and card and getting out of the car. The aftershocks of panic transform into anger, and he slams the car door, glares down at Cas.

The tiger just shakes his wings out and folds them primly before letting them vanish, and then he sits down on the gravel, unrepentant.

Dean closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. “You are changing back. Right now.”

Nothing.

“Cas, I’m not kidding. Change back right now, or I swear, I will turn us around, go right back to Chuck, and tell him I want another companion, because this, this is not gonna work.”

The striped tail swishes back and forth slowly. Cas’s expression gives nothing away, but of course it doesn’t, because _Cas is a fucking tiger_. Dean brings a hand up to his face and pinches the bridge of his nose, because this is giving him a headache. Aren’t companions supposed to make life _easier_ for hunters?

Then Cas nudges at his knee, and he looks down to see that the giant tiger’s head is lowered, eyes soft.

“What, is this you trying to tell me you’re sorry?”

Cas prowls in a tight circle around him, tail curling around his leg, and Dean’s reminded of the way housecats circle their owners’ legs. Except this is on a much bigger, slightly more intimidating scale.

Dean swallows. “Um. Cas, you can’t just—this isn’t okay.”

Cas stops in front of Dean and looks up at him with intent, but Dean doesn’t understand what he’s trying to convey with his eyes. Then, without warning, Cas turns tail and bounds across the empty road and into the barren plot of land.

“Cas! Cas, what the—where are you going?” Dean shouts.

Cas turns around, lets out a growl that somehow comes across as annoyed, and trots back to Dean’s side. This time, he nudges Dean in the direction of that field, and Dean doesn’t get the point.

“What are you trying to do?”

Cas runs past Dean, then pauses and looks back at him.

“This is crazy,” Dean mutters under his breath before jogging after Cas.

Cas makes a happy sound—a purring sound—before taking off again, and Dean thinks he might get the point now. Cas wants to be _chased_. And okay, Dean can work with that. He needs to bond with Cas by doing activities with him outside of hunting, and that’s fine. But how the hell is Dean supposed to chase down a tiger?

But then it occurs to him that Cas is slowing down, pausing to let him catch up every now and then, which means that _fuck_ , Cas isn’t even _trying_.

“Cas!” he finally pants after fifteen, maybe twenty minutes. “Cas—wait! Stop—I—I can’t—”

Dean doubles over, hands braced on his knees, and Cas runs back over to him, slowing down when he gets close. Dean lifts his head to look at Cas and sees that his eyes are bright, radiating satisfaction, and it’s like his happiness is infectious—Dean’s exhausted, and all he wants to do is collapse in a sweaty heap, but he’s _happy_ , and the emotion is all-encompassing, bone-deep.

Cas steps even closer, great, blue eyes fluttering shut, and Dean can only stare as Cas ducks his head and looms ever closer to him. He shuts his eyes just in time to feel the top of Cas’s head press against his face, and his fur is so, so soft, like Dean just face-planted into a thick, tiger-skin rug. All the tension seeps out of him then, and his knees buckle. He sinks down onto his knees, legs still aching from the long run, and Cas just moves with him, head still pressed against Dean’s.

Dean turns his face away so that he can breathe, and Cas’s head drops to Dean’s neck, where he sniffs a few times, much like he had when they were back in Chuck’s viewing room. Then something warm, rough, and a little bit _wet_ is rasping up the length of Dean’s neck, and he shudders, because a _tiger_ is _licking_ him.

“C—Cas!” he splutters, jerking back and falling on his ass. “Don’t do that.”

And fuck, it looks like hurt—honest-to-god _hurt_ —flashes through the tiger’s eyes. Cas stalks past him, and just like that, Dean’s good mood evaporates. What the hell did Cas expect? Getting licked by a tiger is too close to getting bitten by a tiger, which is way too close to getting _eaten_ by a tiger, and that isn’t exactly something that’s high up on Dean’s bucket list.

He lets out a sigh and gets to his feet, turns around to see where Cas got off to. The tiger is steadily walking back the way they came, and Dean groans. He can’t even see the highway anymore.

“Cas, hey. I didn’t mean it,” he says, because it’s stupid to try to out-stubborn an animal. The only thing they’ve got is stubbornness. And yeah, Dean’s referring to Cas as an animal, because Cas refuses to be anything else.

Cas doesn’t slow down, just keeps walking, but he doesn’t speed up either, so Dean forces himself to jog a bit so that he can catch up.

“Oh, c’mon,” he says with a sigh. “You’re not seriously gonna make me do this, are you?”

Cas pauses in his steps and looks up at Dean, and Dean expects to see anger, but all he sees is this strange blankness, like Cas isn’t in there anymore.

“Cas… what…”

Before he can finish his thought, Cas’s wings flap into existence.

“Hey, _no_ —”

But Cas takes off before Dean can grab a hold of him, quickly moving out of Dean’s reach. And then he leaves, flapping off in a direction that Dean knows doesn’t lead to the highway.

“Get back here, you son-of-a-bitch! How am I supposed to apologize if you won’t fucking listen?” Dean shouts, but there’s no response, and Dean groans as he realizes that there’s no tracker on Cas. “Fuck,” he mutters, turning back to head toward the highway. He’ll call Chuck when he gets there, let him know to keep an eye out for Cas. Maybe the tiger will go back to Chuck’s, just like the last time he ran away.

He’s really fucking annoyed by the time he gets to the car because he’s tired, sweaty, dirty, and his legs are sore, and his companion is fucking _gone_ … except that he’s apparently not, because a gigantic, orange-and-black lump is curled up in the dirt next to his baby.

Dean sighs and walks over to the car. “What the hell do you want, Cas? What will it take for you to fucking _talk_ to me?”

Cas lifts his head when Dean gets close, but Dean really can’t tell what he’s feeling. There isn’t that instinctive knowledge that there was yesterday, or hell, just twenty minutes ago.

Dean heaves another sigh, because _what the hell_. “Look, Cas, you just… you caught me by surprise. Tigers don’t lick people, they _eat_ people,” he tries to explain. “You can’t just…”

The shuttered look lifts a bit, and Cas looks… insulted?

“Okay, okay, so I know you wouldn’t eat me,” Dean says. “It’s just… it’s instinct. Tigers eat people, so people try to stay away from tigers. It’s biology at work.”

Cas gets to his feet and nudges at Dean’s hand, but instead of using his forehead as he had the last time, he uses his nose. The bright eyes flit back up to Dean, and Dean lowers himself to a crouch, lifting his hand for Cas’s inspection.

Cas gives the palm a light flick of his tongue, and it’s really not so bad. Dean’s only been licked by a dog once, this huge, extremely energetic German shepherd, and all he really remembers from the experience is that the dog’s breath was disgusting, and there was slobber all over his arm. Sam got licked in the face, which was infinitely grosser, so at least Dean was able to enjoy that.

In contrast, Cas’s tongue is rough. Wet, but not dripping with drool. The patch of skin he licked feels cooler when the wind blows, and Dean doesn’t make any protest, so Cas proceeds to lave over the rest of Dean’s hand thoroughly. Again, Dean is reminded of a giant housecat.

“Okay, pissy cat. Are we good now?” Dean asks when Cas is licking the back of his hand.

Cas shifts, making as though he’s gonna lick Dean’s wrist, and then closes his mouth around it. Dean instantly freezes up, as if not moving will help him get out. But Cas only puts the slightest pressure down on Dean’s arm before releasing it, and he definitely looks smug now. Smug and amused.

Dean rolls his eyes. “That was for the pissy cat comment, wasn’t it?” he says.

Cas doesn’t answer, because he never answers, but Dean thinks he might actually be getting used to it. He reaches out without thinking about it, intending to pet Cas, but Cas shies away, and Dean’s taken aback by how much that rejection stings.

“Dude. Not cool,” he manages.

Cas just backs away from him and shakes his wings back out, clearly ready to take off. Dean grits his teeth and walks over to the front door of the Impala. Cas leaps into the air, spreads his wings wide, and soars off along the road, and Dean glares at his silhouette.

“That son of a bitch,” he grumbles as he gets into the car and starts the engine.

* * *

“Dean! C’mere, boy, let me look at you.”

“Hey, Ellen.” Dean lets Ellen pull him into a hug.

She squeezes him tight before releasing him. “Well. It’s been years since you an’ your daddy last dropped by.”

“Yeah, it’s been a while,” Dean agrees, looking around. It’s about five thirty, and there’s only one hunter sitting at the bar, nursing a beer.

“So, that your companion outside?” Ellen asks, going back behind the bar. Dean looks back over his shoulder and frowns because Cas definitely isn’t visible through any of the windows. “Security feed, genius,” Ellen says before Dean can ask.

“Oh. Of course.”

“Well?”

“Yeah, he’s mine. Name’s Cas.”

“Cas? That short for somethin’?”

“Nope. Just Cas,” Dean answers, but now he’s wondering if there _is_ more to that name, because it isn’t as though Cas is a common name. Maybe he’ll call Chuck sometime.

“Why doesn’t he shift and come on in? You know my bar welcomes companions s’long as they don’t cause any trouble,” Ellen says.

“Uh, he’s stubborn. Likes to stay tiger-shaped as much as he can,” Dean improvises.

“Mhmm,” Ellen says, frowning.

Then a hand claps his back, and Dean turns to see Jo—“Heya Dean, didn’t know you were coming by.”

“Yeah, I uh, didn’t really know myself ‘til about a day ago.”

“Mm. Well, Ash said you rolled in with a companion, and he wouldn’t tell me what it was. Let’s see him—or her.”

“It’s a he,” Dean says, heading for the door.

Then Jo frowns, and Dean knows she’s thinking along the same lines as her mother. “Why doesn’t he—”

“Don’t ask,” Dean interrupts, and Jo punches him in the shoulder. “Ow! You’re really friggin’ abusive, you know that?”

“Well yeah. I gotta be, to deal with jackasses like you.” She pushes her way out of the Roadhouse and then freezes with a gasp. “Oh, _wow_.” She glances back at Dean, and he nods. “Wow, he’s… gorgeous. Can I—”

Cas growls before she can even reach a hand out, and she turns to look at Dean, frowning.

“Uh, what’s up with him?”

“He’s got a bit of an attitude problem,” Dean answers. Cas snorts in response.

“I really don’t think he should be doing that, Dean. I mean, I’ve had Leah for two months, and she’s never given me attitude.”

“I mighta pissed him off on the way here, okay?” Dean says.

Jo shakes her head. “I don’t think you get it, Dean. He isn’t supposed to get his way, _you_ are. You don’t piss him off, he pisses you off.”

“I don’t—”

“Wait, mighta. Why’d you say ‘mighta’?”

“Just a manner of speaking,” Dean says.

“Is he not talking to you?” Jo asks, turning back to face Cas again. The tiger snarls menacingly and takes a few steps toward Jo.

“Cas, cool it,” Dean says.

“No, I wanna see him mad,” Jo says. “If you wanna tell me off, you’re gonna need a _human_ mouth to do it with, you got that?”

Cas crouches down like he’s gonna spring, so Dean grabs Jo and pushes her back toward the Roadhouse.

“Cas! Cas, snap out of it,” Dean says as Cas snakes back and forth like he’s trying to get around Dean.

“C’mon, let him get to me,” Jo says.

“Would you shut your goddamn mouth?” Dean barks without taking his eyes off Cas. Jo sighs loudly but says no more. “Cas,” Dean says, quieter but still forceful. “Cas hey, look at me. Cas.” Dean spreads his arms wide as he steps forward, gets down on one knee so that he’s eye-level with Cas. “Hey,” he says when Cas’s eyes finally meet his. “Everything’s fine. Jo isn’t trying to hurt us, okay?”

Dean holds a hand out and is disproportionately relieved when Cas allows the contact.

“So what are you now, the tiger whisperer?” Jo says mockingly. Then there are a few footsteps, followed by the door to the Roadhouse opening and closing, signaling Jo’s departure.

“Cas, people talk,” Dean says. “You can’t get worked up like that. Jo’s a friend.”

Cas snorts at that, and Dean smiles, because he can tell that Cas is indignant—Cas isn’t mad at him anymore, or he’d be hiding his emotions like he did earlier. It’s good to know that he doesn’t hold grudges for long.

“You can go ahead and fly around for a while, if you want. I’ll be here for a few hours, and since you refuse to go human…”

Cas nods once and spreads his wings, and Dean will never get over the way they just materialize out of thin air. Cas studies Dean for a moment, then steps closer and noses at Dean’s shoulder. Dean’s wary of turning his head away, ‘cause the last time he bared his neck, Cas had licked him.

But Cas just inhales deeply, pulls in a few deep breaths of Dean’s scent before backing away and taking off.  Dean thinks about this as Cas soars away—maybe Cas finds him by smell?

When Cas is too far away to be seen, Dean goes back inside.

* * *

It’s about two in the morning when Dean finally turns out the lights and climbs into bed—Ellen offered up the guest room so that he and Cas could stay the night. Dad called earlier saying that there’d been a complication, and he’d had to go back to Flagstaff to finish the job. He won’t arrive until tomorrow morning at the earliest.

Dean shifts onto his side and takes a deep breath, trying to clear his mind. A soft swishing noise catches his attention, and he opens his eyes. Through the dark, he can faintly see Cas, sitting ramrod straight in the large armchair. The only part of him that stands out is that pair of large, blue eyes, glowing faintly in the dark.

“Aren’t you gonna sleep?” Dean mumbles.

Cas only blinks, eyes still fixed on Dean.

“Dude, stop staring. I can’t sleep with you watching me like that.”

Cas makes a low, rumbling sound but doesn’t turn his attention away.

“Ugh,” Dean groans. He turns onto his other side and closes his eyes again.

Getting Cas to enter the Roadhouse had been hard—Cas had only taken two steps inside before freezing up. Luckily, not many people were there at the time. Ellen had been surprisingly understanding about it all. _Companions typically don’t like this place. Too many scents, too hard for them to parse_ , she’d said.

It made sense, sure, but it still got Dean thinking about all the problems Cas seemed to have.

He and Cas still haven’t had a single conversation, and he really doesn’t get how they’re gonna work together if Cas can’t even freaking _talk_ to him. It’s true that companions act like guardians, but the best ones work as partners as well, and while Dean doesn’t necessarily need a partner, he figures that if he’s gotta have someone following him around all the time… better a partner than a bodyguard.

But these concerns aren’t conducive to restful sleep, so Dean does his best to stop thinking.

Dean is about to fall asleep when he feels the bed dip, and he reaches under his pillow for the knife he always keeps there. But the sheer amount of heat gathering at his back gives away who has crawled onto the bed, and he holds still to see what the tiger will do next.

The mattress makes no sound as Cas moves around. Dean mumbles a little, as though in his sleep, and all motion stops abruptly. Dean rolls onto his back and shifts to get comfortable, still feigning sleep, but surprisingly doesn’t encounter the tiger at all.

When Dean finally settles, there’s still no movement, but Dean’s careful enough not to peek between his eyelids. He waits, determined to out-stubborn Cas, and is rewarded for his effort.

Cas sniffs at Dean’s shoulder and withdraws. Then Dean feels Cas’s warm breath against his cheek, hears some more sniffing sounds. Dean only wrinkles his nose and sighs, but even this reaction causes stillness to fall over the room. After some more patience, Cas nestles on Dean’s left, right up against him so that the covers are tucked close to his body, and a warm weight—Cas’s head?—rests on Dean’s shoulder.

Dean stiffens at this—he can’t help it—and the weight on his shoulder disappears.

“Cas,” Dean says, opening his eyes, and those giant, blue eyes are hovering so close to him. He can’t read the emotion in those eyes, but he’s already accidentally pushed Cas away once today, and he doesn’t wanna do it again. “Thought I told you to stop staring,” he mutters, reaching a hand up.

His hand bumps into Cas’s shoulder, and he follows it up until his hand is on the back of Cas’s neck. He exerts a bit of light pressure, but Cas doesn’t move, only continues to stare.

“I just gave you a direct order, Cas.”

Cas blinks once, but as soon as his eyes are open again, they lock with Dean’s.

“I can’t sleep with you staring like that. Lie down again,” Dean says, putting more pressure on the back of Cas’s neck to pull him down—he’d rather have Cas sleep right by him than continue to stare at him like that.

But it’s like Cas is made of stone underneath all that fur, because he doesn’t move at all when Dean pulls at him. Dean pulls harder, but Cas still doesn’t react.

“I don’t get it,” Dean says finally. “What the hell is the matter with you?”

Of course, there’s no response.

Dean rubs his other hand over his face and resists the urge to groan. “Would you just let me get to sleep before you start staring? Please?”

Cas blinks again. Then, to Dean’s surprise, he lies back down and rests his head on Dean’s shoulder again, and Dean gets the feeling that he’s much more comfortable with this arrangement than he should be.

It takes Dean less than a minute to fall asleep.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't expect updates to come as close together to each other as these two did. I forgot to say this in the notes for the previous chapter, but you totally have [Squishy](http://draconicanimagus.tumblr.com) to thank for this because I promised her that I would work on this fic while I was in China, bwahaha.

The first thing Dean notices when he wakes up is that Cas is gone. He looks around the room but doesn’t see the tiger anywhere. Frowning, he throws the covers off himself and gets out of bed. If Cas wanted to leave the room, he would’ve had to turn human to work the doorknob, right?

Dean pulls on his shoes—he typically sleeps fully dressed, without even taking off his shoes, but he feels safer at the Roadhouse than at a random motel—and exits the room. The hallway is empty, and Dean treads softly, because he doesn’t actually know what time it is, and Jo and Ellen might still be sleeping. He moves to the end of the hallway and goes downstairs, ending up in a small walkway at the back of the building. He walks around to the front, but Cas is still nowhere to be seen, and an involuntary shiver passes through Dean.

Where is that damn cat?

Dean passes by the empty bar and vacant tables to the front entrance, glancing over at the door to Ash’s room on the other side of the bar. Could Ash have taken Cas? Probably not. Not without waking Dean, anyway. Cas had to have gone on his own.

Dean turns the knob and starts pushing the door open, but it crashes into something and comes back at Dean. The something— _someone_ —grunts, startled, and backs up to let Dean open the door.

“Sorry,” Dean and the stranger say simultaneously, and _wow_ , that’s a low voice.

“What were you doing so close to the door?” Dean says, frowning as he looks the stranger over. The man standing in front of him is dressed in ill-fitting blue jeans—maybe a size too big for him—a grey t-shirt, and a dark jacket. His hair is dark brown, almost black, and his eyes are a vibrant shade of blue.

The stranger smiles. “I was about to open it,” he answers.

“Right,” Dean says. He considers asking the guy whether or not he’s seen a tiger anywhere, but that would be too suspicious—a licensed hunter would never lose his companion because of the tracker in its collar.

“If you wouldn’t mind…” the man says, indicating that he’d like Dean to step aside.

But Dean stands his ground, because this is still Jo and Ellen’s place, and they’re not even awake yet. “Why are you here?”

“What?”

“Why are you here?” Dean repeats.

“I hardly see how that’s any of your business,” the stranger says, and the smile has turned cold.

“It’s just that I’m friends with the people who own this place, and—”

“I only wanted to ask for directions. I’m a little turned around.”

Dean blinks, surprised—he had assumed that the stranger was a hunter because he was trying to get into the Roadhouse, but if he’s just asking for directions… is he a civilian? “Not from around here?” Dean asks instead.

“No.”

The stranger offers nothing else, and Dean smiles. “I can probably help you out, then. I’m Alonso Mosely. And you are…?”

“You’re a good liar,” the stranger replies, and Dean’s smile slips slightly. But before he can say anything, the man continues, “My name is James Novak. You can call me Jimmy.”

His overall demeanor might be nice and polite, but his eyes are challenging, assessing, and Dean decides to play along, unwilling to back down. “That your real name?”

“You didn’t give out your real name. Naturally, I wouldn’t give out mine.”

“Fair enough. Where are you trying to go?” Dean asks.

Jimmy looks Dean over a moment longer before shaking his head. “Never mind. I’ll go to the next place down the road. It probably wouldn’t be wise to trust a stranger who can’t even tell me his own name.”

He turns to leave, but Dean’s hand shoots out and snatches his wrist. It’s surprisingly thin, thin enough that Dean feels like it’d be almost too easy to break it.

“Let go of me.”

Dean looks down at his hand. “Sorry. I…” he pulls his hand back, “I don’t know why I did that.” It’s the truth—he’d reached out without thinking about it.

Jimmy backs up a step as soon as he’s released. “It was…” he pauses, searching for a word, “…interesting to meet you.”

Dean doesn’t answer, only watches as Jimmy turns and walks away. Then he looks around the parking lot and sees that there are no cars other than the Impala and Ellen’s truck. “Hey, you need a ride?” he calls out.

“No, thanks,” Jimmy answers without turning back.

Dean stands in the doorway for a moment, scanning the skies for any sign of Cas, because his disappearance is still suspicious as hell. He looks at Jimmy’s retreating back and remembers how bright his eyes were. Is it possible that Jimmy… but no. Cas is Dean’s companion—only Dean can remove his collar. And Jimmy was definitely collarless.

“Whatcha lookin’ at?” Ash asks from behind him, and Dean only just stops himself from jumping.

“Nothing,” Dean answers, turning around. “Some guy stopped by looking for directions. I sent him away.”

“Mm,” Ash says. “So where’s that tiger of yours? Jo was complaining about him last night.”

“I let him out for a flight,” Dean lies. “He likes stretching his wings.”

Ash raises an eyebrow. “Wings? I didn’t see any wings on the security feed.”

“Yeah, I know.”

A flapping sound catches Dean’s attention, and he turns in time to see Cas touching down next to the Impala. The tiger trots toward Dean, shaking his wings out before tucking them close to his back and letting them vanish. Dean hears Ash’s quick inhale but doesn’t turn to enjoy the look of surprise that must be on Ash’s face—he’s too busy watching Cas.

“Now _that_ is something I’ve never seen before,” Ash comments.

Cas comes right up to Dean and looks up at him, as unrepentant as ever, and Dean wants to be mad at Cas for slipping out without telling him, but he finds that it’s hard to make the anger stick. He reaches down to pet Cas, and the tiger arches up into the contact, purring.

“He doesn’t _look_ rude,” Ash observes.

“Nah. Jo went and pissed him off, is all,” Dean says.

Cas looks past Dean at Ash. “Hmm,” Ash says as Dean backs into the Roadhouse. “So, what’s he like?”

“What do you mean?” Dean asks, watching as Cas passes through the doorway. He doesn’t hesitate this time, heading straight for the back.

“Well I mean, he’s been here for a while, and he hasn’t shown himself yet. I figure he’s shy,” Ash says. “It’s not anything I haven’t seen before, anyway. So what’s he like?”

Dean shrugs. “He’s just a guy. I don’t know what you want me to say.” When Ash doesn’t say anything else, Dean decides to go back upstairs. “I’ll go let Cas into the guest room,” he says, turning to leave.

“Okay, then. And no worries, I won’t tell anyone.”

Dean frowns. “Won’t tell anyone what?”

“The collar?” Ash says. “I might be something of a specialist with electronics. I know when a tracking device is working, when it’s not, and when there isn’t one installed.”

“Okay, and what are you saying about Cas?” Dean asks, wary.

Ash starts heading back toward his room, passing by the pool tables as he does. “I think you know that better than I do, Winchester. Just be careful.”

“Thanks, Ash. I will.”

Ash spins around to wink at Dean, and then he disappears into his room.

Dean stares at his closed door for a moment before heading toward the back of the Roadhouse. When he reenters the guest room, he finds that Cas is already inside, sitting on the foot of the bed.

“Where’d you go this morning?” Dean asks, shutting the door behind him.

Cas lies down, resting his head on his paws, and gazes up at Dean.

“Dude. Aren’t you supposed to put my safety before everything else? How could you just leave without even waking me up, anyway?”

Cas shuts his eyes and yawns. He doesn’t open his eyes again, and Dean shakes his head. He’s heard that there are ways to force companions to shift, but those are illegal. And while the law usually doesn’t mean all that much to Dean, these methods are illegal for good reason—it’s torture to force shifting.

“Cas,” Dean says, exasperated.

When he doesn’t continue, Cas’s large eyes flick open again. Dean wishes he had something more to say, but at this point he really doesn’t know what there is for him to tell Cas. Then Cas steps off the bed and walks up to Dean’s side, but he doesn’t stop there, moving behind Dean and coming back around in a small circle. Reminiscent of yesterday’s gesture, Cas’s tail curls around Dean’s leg, and Dean sighs.

“That isn’t always gonna work. You’re gonna have to talk to me eventually.”

Cas snorts and removes his tail with a light swish. He circles back around so that he’s fully facing Dean, and Dean wonders if he’s finally going to shift. But he just sits down and looks up at Dean imploringly.

“What’s wrong?” Dean asks. “Is it… is it because you _can’t?_ ”

The tiger’s eyes drop to the ground, and he lets out a low rumbling sound that could mean anything.

Dean slowly gets down on his knees. “Just… answer me. Somehow. Cas, please.”

Cas meets Dean’s eyes and then slowly shakes his head.

“Then… I really don’t know why you’re so hesitant.”

Without breaking their gaze, Cas stands and steps forward, dropping his head to nudge at Dean’s chest, and Dean strokes the fur at the scruff of his neck, scratching just above the collar. Cas presses harder, and Dean lets himself be pushed, sits back on his heels. But Cas keeps pushing, and Dean stays firm.

“Hey— _hey_. Stop that,” he says sternly.

Cas only snorts again and pushes harder, but Dean manages to keep his balance.

“Quit it!” he hisses. “What’re you trying to do, huh?”

When Cas backs up, he’s got that hurt look in his eyes again, and Dean realizes that he really, _really_ doesn’t like it. But Cas turns away quickly and slips across the room. His wings suddenly make an appearance, but Dean knows that Cas can’t get out of the room without his say-so.

“You’re such a dick, you know that?” Dean says.

Cas’s head jerks up, and when his eyes meet Dean’s, he looks indignant again. He makes a huffing sound and sits down, folding his wings up but not putting them away. Dean approaches slowly, eyes on the wings because he hasn’t had a chance to look at them up close before.

The black feathers are glossy, perfectly arranged, and Dean wonders how they can possibly stay so well-kept without grooming. The sunlight that filters into the room between the blinds reflects off the sleek feathers, and Dean just wants to run his fingers over the surface of one wing.

“Cas, can I?” he says.

No response.

“Unless you growl or something, I’m taking your silence as a yes.”

Cas blinks once, slowly, and then extends one wing, displaying the feathers to Dean. He reaches a hand out, hesitantly, and strokes just over the surface. Cas pushes his wing up into the contact, and Dean takes the hint, pressing a little harder and letting the feathers slip between his fingers. They’re smooth and stiff, and when Dean presses still harder, the membrane beneath is firm.

Cas purrs, shifts closer to Dean, and lifts his wing. Dean doesn’t get it at first, but then he realizes that the tiger is baring the soft, more vulnerable underside of his wing to him. So he runs his fingers through these feathers, small and baby-soft— _fluffy_ , almost. It’s about as plush as the fur on the rest of Cas’s body, and when Dean scratches lightly, Cas hums and leans his head against Dean’s hip.

“Feels good, huh?” Dean says.

He needs to stop phrasing these things as questions, he tells himself, because it’s not like Cas is ever gonna answer him.

His phone rings then, and Cas, startled, jerks away from Dean and vanishes his wings.

Annoyed because the moment’s over, Dean digs his phone out of his pocket and says, “Yep.”

“Dean.” It’s Dad. “I’ll be at the Roadhouse in a few minutes.”

“Oh. Okay, I’ll bring him down, then.”

“Good.”

Dad hangs up, and Dean looks over at Cas.

“Still not changing?” he asks, just in case Cas decides, by some miracle, that he wants to shift now—he must have shifted to get in and out of the room, right? “My dad’s gonna wanna talk to you, y’know.”

Cas just looks between Dean and the door expectantly.

“Yeah okay, fine,” Dean says, going to the door and opening it so Cas can go outside.

They head downstairs and find Jo at the bar, juggling empty shot glasses. “Morning, boys!” she says cheerily, catching two of the shot glasses in one hand and the last in the other. “Where’re you going?”

“My dad’s coming,” Dean says.

“Oh, right. Is he staying, or—”

“I doubt he’ll be staying,” Dean answers. Dad hadn’t sounded like he was planning to be here long. He’s never anywhere for long, to be honest—always looking for the next hunt, the next kill. “You know how he is,” he says to Jo, and she just nods.

“Is Cas still being a grumpy-face?” she asks.

Dean glances over and sees that the tiger seems to be ignoring their conversation in favor of watching the door. “Eh, he’s fine,” Dean decides.

“But he still hasn’t shifted for you,” Jo says, frowning. “You should have an expert—”

“I got him from Carver Edlund,” Dean interrupts. “The guy didn’t have a clue what was wrong with Cas, and he’s the guy who managed to make the first companion. I don’t think there’s anyone with more expertise.”

Jo nods, still frowning. “Yeah, I guess you’re right. I can’t believe Dr. Edlund let you take him, if he was malfunctioning like this.”

At the mention of “malfunctioning,” Cas turns his head toward Jo and lets out a low growl, and okay, apparently he _is_ listening.

“Oh, you don’t like being called ‘broken,’ do you?” Jo taunts.

“Jo, just leave him alone,” Dean says.

“But that’s what he is, if he won’t shift. Unless he proves me wrong by shifting, then I’m gonna go on treating him like he’s broken,” Jo says.

Cas snorts, anger flashing in his eyes, and Dean rests a hand on his head. “Y’know, Cas, you wouldn’t run into issues with Jo if you’d just shift,” he says.

“You shouldn’t talk to him when he’s like that. Ignore him ‘til he shifts, or something.”

“Stop it, Jo. Cas and I are fine,” Dean says.

Jo rolls her eyes and says, “Yeah, whatever you say. He’s your problem, anyway.”

The door opens then, and Dad walks in. His eyes immediately flit around the room, scoping the place out even as he starts toward Dean.

“Hey, John,” Jo says.

“Jo,” Dad says with a perfunctory smile. “You look more like your father every time I see you.”

Jo flashes a brief smile before excusing herself and disappearing to the back room, leaving Dean alone with his dad at the bar. Dad makes a move toward Dean, but Cas puts himself between them, head tipped back, probably to meet Dad’s eyes.

Frowning, Dad says, “That your companion?”

“Yeah,” Dean says, wondering how the hell he’s gonna explain that Cas doesn’t shift. “His name is Cas.”

“A little… furrier than I was expecting,” Dad says, still looking down at the tiger. “Aren’t we going to talk?”

“We _are_ talking,” Dean says. He steps to Cas’s side and squats down, placing a hand on Cas’s back to ground him. “This is my dad, Cas,” he says. “Family.”

Cas’s head swings round so that he can look at Dean with one big eye, and then he fixes his gaze back on Dad, considering.

“Dean,” Dad says, and that’s definitely a warning tone.

“Okay, okay, look,” Dean says, licking his lips. “He uh, he can’t take human form.”

Dad finally looks away from Cas to fix disbelieving eyes on Dean. When he sees that Dean isn’t joking, he says, “So he’s broken. Chuck gave you a broken—”

“He’s fine,” Dean says, but Dad’s already turning away, walking down the length of the bar and running a hand through his hair agitatedly. “Dad—”

Then Dad turns around, and holy shit, he’s got a _gun_ , and he’s _pointing it at Dean_ —

There’s the sound of a gunshot, and Dean ducks to the side, but he knows that he hasn’t cleared the bullet, not entirely. He braces himself for pain in his left arm, and when he doesn’t feel any pain immediately, his mind instantly skips to the worst scenario—maybe the bullet severed some nerves in his arm, and aw hell, what if he’ll never be able to use his left arm again?

It takes a second for Dean to realize that there’s no pain in his arm because there’s no bullet in his arm, and his eyes land on the snarling tiger that’s still crouched protectively in front of him. There’s blood on the ground, proof that Dad really did fire that bullet, which—what the actual fuck?

“Cas!” Dean barks, taking two quick steps over to Cas’s side and looking for the wound.

“Looks like he’s not completely broken—not in the way that counts, at least,” Dad says, contemplative.

“What the fuck, Dad?” Dean blurts out, finding Cas’s left shoulder matted with blood. The tiger is still growling, but he doesn’t react outwardly when Dean puts pressure on the wound, trying to stem the bleeding.

“What the hell kind o’ tone is that, boy?” Dad says, deadly calm.

A door bangs open, and Ellen demands, “What the hell’s going on in here?”

“You pointed your gun at me,” Dean says without looking at Dad, running his free hand up and down Cas’s right flank to try to calm him down. “You could’ve killed me.”

“I knew you’d dodge,” Dad says, unapologetic.

“You knew I’d—” Dean sets his jaw. “Fuck you.”

“How _dare_ you—”

“John?” Ellen says, and her voice has the same kind of quiet anger that Dad’s gets when he’s really pissed off. “Why don’t you tell me why Dean’s companion is bleeding all over my floor?”

It’s silent for a long moment, and then Cas is twisting out of Dean’s arms, snarling.

“Cas, _wait_ —” Dean says, looking up to see that the new perceived threat is Jo, standing a few feet away from them with a clean, white towel. Cas is still bleeding sluggishly, and the fact that he’s still standing on his injured leg can’t be making things better. “Just throw that to me,” Dean says to Jo, reaching over to put his hand back on Cas’s back.

“I’m still waiting for my explanation,” Ellen says. “If you don’t tell me, I’m going to have to ask you to leave.”

“His companion isn’t fully functional,” Dad says. “I only wanted to test whether or not—”

“By shooting a gun at your own son?” Ellen says, incredulous.

Meanwhile, Dean presses the towel to Cas’s shoulder and says, “Can you guys talk about this somewhere else? I don’t think Cas is going anywhere anytime soon, and I really don’t wanna hear any of Dad’s bullshit right now.”

“Son—” Dad starts.

Dean hears the sound of a rifle cocking, and then Ellen says, “John Winchester, we are leaving this room and having a very serious talk about what you just did.” There’s a pause, and she adds, “I swear, I _will_ shoot you, if I have to.”

“This isn’t over,” Dad says, and Dean knows that the words are directed at him.

“Oh, it’s over,” Dean says.

Dad makes his way over to the exit, and soon, Ellen’s footsteps follow. But Cas is still tense, coiled up like he’s ready to spring, and Dean looks around and notes that Jo is still in the room. Ash is also here, edging closer from his spot near the pool tables.

“Can you both go? I’ll clean this up, I promise,” Dean says.

“Yeah,” Jo says. “And don’t worry about clean-up. It wasn’t your fault, anyway. Ash can do it.”

“ _Hey_. If you wanna be nice, why don’t you offer to clean up yourself?” Ash says.

“Guys?” Dean says, lifting his head again to look between the two.

“Okay, okay, going,” Ash says, heading back toward his room.

Cas remains stiff under Dean’s hands even after they’re gone, though, and Dean sighs, running a hand through his soft fur.

“You’re gonna be fine, Cas,” he says quietly, pulling the towel back to look at it. The blood hasn’t quite soaked through, and Cas’s shoulder seems to be mostly done bleeding already. “God, I’m sorry,” Dean mutters. “I had no idea he would—”

Cas cuts him off with a soft huffing sound, turning toward him and regarding him with serious eyes. Dean pulls his hands back and waits for Cas to make up his mind, wishing not for the first time that he could read the tiger’s mind. Then Cas inches forward and straightens his neck, pressing the top of his head up against the bottom of Dean’s chin.

“Oh,” Dean says. “Is that—are you trying to make me feel better?”

Cas just sniffs, nose hovering near Dean’s collarbone, and nudges Dean’s chin again.

“Okay,” Dean says, hands coming up to rest somewhere around Cas’s shoulders. He’s careful not to touch Cas’s wound, though he knows that companions are capable of healing fast—a boon of being supernatural creatures, he supposes.

He isn’t sure how long they stay there, but eventually he pulls away, and Cas takes a step back. His eyes seem a lot more relaxed now than they were earlier, a lot of tension having drained away from his body, and Dean shakes his head.

“I can’t believe you did that,” he says, and Cas looks at him like he’s an idiot—it’s a look that Dean’s getting very used to seeing. “Okay, so I know it’s your—your job, I guess, to protect me, but still. We’ve been having issues since day one, man. I just…”

His voice trails off, and he looks over at Cas, hoping that the tiger can understand. Cas only nods once before stalking away without even the slightest limp, and Dean wonders if he’s already healed completely.

The front door opens, and Dean gets back to his feet. “Ellen,” he says. “Is Dad—”

“Gone,” Ellen says. “I told him to apologize, but he said he wouldn’t, so I made him hit the road.”

Dean sighs, suddenly tired. “Sorry, Ellen,” he says, looking at the pool of blood on the floor. “I can clean this up for you.”

“It’s fine, Dean. I’ll take care of it,” Ellen says, walking toward the bar. She claps Dean on the shoulder as she passes and continues, “You just look after that companion of yours. He might be a little different from the others, but he’s a good one.”

“Yeah, I guess he is,” Dean says, looking over at the tiger that’s seated at the foot of the stairs with its back to him. “I guess he is,” he repeats to himself, softer.


	4. Chapter 4

Dean and Cas leave for Stanford not long after the mishap with Dad. Apparently, being shot in the shoulder has no effect on Cas’s flying—or his walking or running, for that matter—and he takes off without hesitation when Dean says that they’re going back on the road. Dean drives for about fourteen hours, stopping only to grab a bite to eat and refill on gas, before stopping for the night in a Nevada city called Elko.

It’s a quiet trip, pretty much exactly the same as the ones Dean used to make before he got Cas, and it makes sense—the son of a bitch won’t talk to him, after all, and whenever Dean’s in the car, Cas is out of sight, flapping away somewhere else.

They’re back on the road the next morning, and about five hours in, it’s lunchtime, and it just so happens that Dean’s a few miles away from Lake Tahoe. So he decides to stop for lunch and just hang out by the lake for a while—he’s still got plenty of time before two weeks is up, after all. Hell, he could totally make it to Stanford by dinner, with time to spare.

He parks the car in front of a small diner and gets out, leaning against the car door to wait for Cas. The tiger lands promptly, maybe only thirty seconds after Dean got out of the car, and Dean smiles.

“Heya, Cas. You tired yet?”

Cas just sends an unimpressed look in Dean’s direction.

“Yeah, yeah. Well I’m hungry, so I’m gonna grab a bite to eat, and then we’re gonna go look at the lake,” Dean says.

Cas nods and sits down on the gravel beside the Impala—they learned the hard way that most places don’t allow large companions indoors, especially natural predators, when they’re in their animal form. And since Cas still won’t shift, Dean has no choice but to leave him by the car while he goes to get food.

He emerges later with a milkshake in one hand and a paper bag containing a burger, fries, and a slice of pie in the other. Cas perks up at the sight of him, getting to his feet.

Grinning, Dean says, “Yeah, good to see you too, grumpy.”

Cas’s face falls a little, and it still amazes Dean just how expressive this tiger is. He opens the car door, puts the bag of food in the passenger seat, and fits the milkshake in the cup holder. Twisting around, he considers Cas for a moment before backing up and moving toward the back door. Cas just watches silently as Dean pulls open the back door and gestures for him to go inside.

“C’mon, don’t you wanna go for a ride? You can rest your wings a little,” Dean says.

Cas only blinks up at him mistrustfully.

Dean sighs. “Cas, c’mon. Get in the car.”

After a pause, Cas steps toward the car, sniffing the leather seat before lifting one paw to press it against the frame.

“Go on,” Dean urges, nudging Cas a little with his knee.

The tiger finally leaps up onto the seats, careful not to hit his head on the roof of the car, and Dean pushes the door closed behind him. Then he gets in up front, pointedly not thinking about the fur that’ll probably be all over the upholstery. He’s gotta bond with Cas, he reminds himself, and besides, Cas has earned at least this much for taking that bullet.

“All right, let’s find a place with a good view,” Dean says, starting the car and putting her in reverse.

* * *

Dean ends up parking his baby at one of the turnouts along the highway where tourists stop to take pictures. He gets out of the car, food and drink in hand, and hikes down a pretty damn steep hill, stopping at a fallen log that has an unobstructed view of the lake.

It’s beautiful, a deep, blue color that sparkles in the sun and reminds him of Cas’s eyes.

He digs in to his burger, and well, he’s had better, but it’s pretty damn good. Cas sneaks a few fries from the package, and Dean just laughs and dumps some onto the log next to him to make it easier for him.

“I didn’t think tigers ate potatoes,” he comments, unable to stop smiling as Cas eats the fries. “Y’know, if you shifted into your human form, I could introduce you to a lot more food. I’ll bet you’ve never had pie before. Chuck didn’t look like a pie guy.”

Cas looks amused when he turns his head toward Dean.

“Yeah, you judge me all you want. You’ve never had pie before—you don’t even know what you’re missing.”

Cas just snorts and walks around the log to Dean’s front, nudging Dean’s knee with his nose.

“What do you want?”

The tiger yawns widely before nudging Dean again.

“Yeah, buddy, that’s uh, not really getting your message across,” Dean says before taking another bite of his burger. Cas seems like he wants something, Dean thinks, but he has no clue what it is. Frowning, he swallows and says, “Do you wanna go for another run? Is that it?”

Cas nods once.

“Uh, all right. Let me just finish up here, okay?”

Cas huffs and paces back and forth in front of Dean for a minute before returning to his knee. He sniffs at Dean’s denim-enclosed calf before plopping to the ground with a great sigh. Dean can’t help but laugh at his impatience.

A few minutes later, Dean balls up the wrapper of his burger and shoves it into the original paper bag, along with the empty fry container. The empty cup barely fits inside, but at least it means Dean can carry it all in one hand. Cas gets to his feet, eyes following Dean’s motions expectantly.

“Let me throw this stuff away,” Dean says, because he may not be an environmentalist, and he would never volunteer to go out and pick up trash for community service, or whatever, but he won’t make it hard on people who do care about that kind of stuff.

As he starts climbing back up toward his car, his phone rings, and he tugs it out of his pocket with his free hand. “Yep?” he says, realizing belatedly that he forgot to check whether or not it was Dad.

“Uh—Dean?”

Definitely not Dad. “Yeah uh, who’s this?”

“It’s uh, it’s Chuck.”

And right, the nervousness in his voice should have been a clue. “Oh, Chuck, hey. You okay?”

“Y-Yeah. Fine,” Chuck says. “How’s Cas?”

“He’s okay,” Dean answers slowly. “Still hasn’t shifted human for me yet, but we’re getting along fine. You sure you’re okay? You sound… jittery.”

“Uh, see, it’s a uh,” Chuck pauses to clear his throat, and Dean stops walking, concerned. “I just wanted to point out—I mean, it’s probably nothing, but I didn’t want to take any chances—but then again, it’s my job on the line, and I can’t just—”

“Jesus, Chuck, slow down,” Dean says. “One thing at a time. What’s wrong with your job? That is, what did you want to point out that’d put your job on the line?”

There’s a pause, and Dean can hear light, uneven breaths on the other end of the line.

“Chuck!”

“Yeah! Yeah, uh, look, it’s omens,” Chuck finally gets out. “Demon omens,” he clarifies, and Dean immediately stiffens, because he hasn’t heard about demons for… hell, for _years_.

Hardly any have been seen since about sixteen years ago—you could probably list off the demon encounters on one hand. And he _wouldn’t_ care, except that Mom was killed by a demon when Dean was only four years old, and Dad didn’t have a chance to catch the damned son of a bitch before demons vanished pretty much without a trace.

Sometimes Dean thinks that’s part of the reason why Dad is so freakin’ paranoid—apparently, the demons disappeared seemingly overnight, right around the time that the existence of monsters became common knowledge.

“What kind of omens?” Dean finds himself asking.

“Look, I can’t—” Chuck sighs. “I can’t say anything. But they sent me on a business trip to West Virginia, real hush-hush, and… fuck, if they find out—”

“Why didn’t you call my dad?”

“What are you, _crazy?_ They’d recognize the number,” Chuck answers. “ _Everything_ about him is flagged. I accidentally on purpose caught sight of some logs, and they have three listed phone numbers—”

Okay, so they probably don’t have Dad’s backup-backup phone, good to know.

“—and his old house in Lawrence, and a couple safe houses around the U.S., all on file. I couldn’t possibly call him. Nothing on you or your brother, though. Not yet, at least,” Chuck finishes.

“Where’d you say you were?” Dean asks.

“West Virginia. There’s a facility here, the bigger, fancier version of the one I set up in Iron River. I’m flying out tonight, but I swear, there’s—”

“I can’t go,” Dean says.

“What?”

“I can’t go,” Dean repeats. “I’m on my way to Stanford—I’ve gotta introduce my brother to Cas as family, remember?”

Chuck sighs heavily. “Yeah. Yeah, you’re right,” he says. “Could you just—tell your dad, then. He’s been on the lookout for demons for a long time, and I have a feeling he’s gonna want to see this.”

“Okay,” Dean says. “Take care o’ yourself.”

“You too, Dean. You tell your dad to be careful, too.”

“I will. Thanks for the heads-up,” Dean says.

“Oh, and don’t call me on this number.”

“Why not?”

“It’s a disposable phone,” Chuck says. “I’m tossing it as soon as I hang up.”

Dean almost laughs. “Is that really necessary?”

“I only got to see the V’s and W’s, and a couple X’s on the list. Who knows which phones of mine they’re monitoring?” Chuck asks, the worry doubling in his voice.

“Okay, okay, calm down. Just—calm down.”

“Yeah,” Chuck says, taking deep breaths. “Thanks, Dean.”

“No problem. Maybe I’ll swing by and take Cas up to visit sometime, okay? You just stay alive.”

Chuck laughs nervously. “Yeah. Piece of cake.”

“Bye,” Dean says.

“Bye,” Chuck squeaks, and then the line goes dead.

Dean looks down at his phone and then over at Cas, who’s looking back up at him. “Did you hear any of Chuck’s side of the conversation?” he asks. When Cas nods, he says, “So, what do you think? Should I call Dad about this?”

Cas seems to consider this for a moment before nodding.

Sighing, Dean says, “Yeah, guess I should.”

Dad picks up on the fourth ring. “Yeah.”

He’s clearly still angry. What the hell does _he_ have to be mad about? “Hey, Dad,” Dean says. “Look, I’m not calling about our fight. I just wanted to—”

“I’m sorry,” Dad says.

Dean’s thoughts come to a halt abruptly. “Wait—what?”

“Sorry, Dean. I should never have pointed that gun at you. I hardly even know what came over me,” Dad says. “I’d just come off a very long drive, preceded by a hunt that I screwed up and had to go fix.” He pauses, but Dean still doesn’t have his voice back just yet, so Dad continues, “I was too late to save the family. They had two kids—one was four and the other only six months old, just like you and Sammy. I know it’s no excuse. I just—I’m sorry.”

Dean swallows hard. “It’s okay, Dad.”

“No, it’s not. I keep—” he lets out a frustrated sigh before going on, “I keep treating you like—”

“Dad—”

“Would you just let me finish?” Dad barks, and it’s startling that he phrased it as a request and not a command. “I’ve treated you like a soldier,” he says, “and I’ve always told myself that it was for your own good because you had to be tough, and to be tough, you had to have a good drill sergeant. I just… I don’t know when I forgot that I was your father, too. And for that, I’m sorry.”

Dean’s silent for a long moment, a hard lump in his throat because he’s never heard anything like this from Dad’s lips before.

“Dean?”

“Yeah, I’m here,” Dean says, fighting to keep his voice steady. “Jesus Christ, Dad, you can’t—you can’t just dump shit like that on me without warning.”

Dad laughs shakily, and _Jesus_ , it’s clear that he’s just as affected by this as Dean is. “Why don’t you tell me why you called?” he asks, and his tone is so much gentler than it usually is.

“Christo,” Dean says into the receiver, and he’s rewarded with another wavering laugh. “No but seriously, uh, an old friend called,” he says, remembering at the last moment that he doesn’t know which three numbers ‘they’ have on Dad.

“Old friend, huh?” Dad repeats, and for the first time Dean’s grateful that they have a system worked out for communicating when people might be eavesdropping.

“Yeah. Said he owes you money, wants you to come collect,” Dean says—in other words, Dean’s not in danger, but Dad needs to go check something out.

“Okay. Where does he want to meet?”

“Uh…” Dean mentally runs through the last couple states quickly—Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming—and answers, “Wisconsin.” Dad had made him memorize the states in alphabetical order so that he could give the name of the state succeeding the state that he actually meant to talk about.

“Okay, then. I’ll head in that direction,” Dad says. “Take care o’ yourself, Dean.”

“Yeah, I will,” Dean says, a small smile stretching his lips a little.

Dad hangs up then, and Dean looks at his phone for a moment before snapping it shut and shoving it back in his pocket.

Gathering himself, he finishes the climb back up to his car and looks around for a trashcan, but since this is just a random turnoff on the road, there aren’t any trashcans. He leaves his trash in the passenger seat of the Impala and turns to find Cas right in front of him, still waiting to run, apparently.

“Okay, fine,” Dean says, locking the door and pushing it closed. “Go on.”

But Cas just stares at him, and Dean frowns, because last time Cas had just taken off. If he wants to run, but he’s not running, then what…

“Aw, shit,” Dean says, making the connection.

This time, Cas wants to chase Dean. Fuck, Dean thinks as he turns his back. Fuck, he’s about to be chased down by a goddamn _tiger_. _Voluntarily_.

“Here goes nothing,” he mutters under his breath before taking off at a light jog.

Behind him, he can’t hear Cas’s feet on the pavement, but it’s not long before Cas growls, so close to Dean that he almost stumbles. He breaks into a sprint then, veering to his left and down the steep hill. Cas follows, crashing through the undergrowth and making far more of a racket than Dean is.

Shit, Dean doesn’t even know if he’s gonna be able to stop himself. He’s hardly able to keep up with his own momentum, legs moving on autopilot and jolting at each impact with the ground. Dean narrowly avoids running straight into a tree, able to leap slightly to the side just in time to clear it, left arm raised to keep the branches from hitting his face.

Goddamn, he’s gonna run straight into the fucking lake at this rate.

The slope only evens out a little bit as the trees thin, and yeah, it definitely looks like Dean’s gonna be going for a swim today, whether he wants to or not.

Then there’s a mighty roar from behind him, and he lifts his head in time to see a white belly, streaked with a few lines of black, soaring over him. Cas lands hard several yards ahead, turning around to face Dean, and what the hell does he think he’s doing?

The tiger rears up just as Dean’s reaching him, and Dean sticks his arms out, attempting in vain to brace himself. His hands sink into tiger fur just before he slams right into Cas’s chest, and the tiger lets out a grunt, falling onto his back.

“Oh, god,” Dean groans, jarred by the suddenness of the impact, but he’s unhurt and _dry_ and lying on top of Cas, which—

Cas turns onto his side, and Dean falls to the ground, on his back. He starts to sit up, but then Cas is standing over him, paws on either side of his torso, and Dean lets his head hit the ground again.

“Okay, you win,” he says, out of breath.

Cas makes a pleased humming sound and steps forward, moving his paws to either side of Dean’s head, and Dean just holds his gaze, unsure what Cas is planning. He’s sure he can trust the guy—Cas took a bullet for him, he reminds himself—but he can’t help but feel uneasy as Cas starts lowering his head.

When Cas is too close for Dean to properly focus on his face, Dean squeezes his eyes shut.

Whiskers tickle his nose, and then a wet nose bumps into his cheek, snuffling gently. Dean holds completely still—he can’t remember the last time he stayed so still—and lets Cas sniff his way along the arch of Dean’s cheekbone to his ear. Dean tilts his head the other way to allow for easier access, and Cas purrs in approval, his nose trailing down the length of Dean’s neck.

Dean’s pulse kicks up when he feels hot breath on his neck, an indication that Cas has opened his mouth, but still he doesn’t shy away.

“Cas,” he says, but he doesn’t have anything to follow it up with.

Cas only purrs again, louder this time, and laps at Dean’s neck, from the crook where his neck meets his shoulder up to the bolt of his jaw.

Maybe it’s a territory thing, Dean thinks. Maybe Cas is marking Dean as his owner. Housecats do that, don’t they? Only a housecat would just rub against his owner’s legs instead of getting all up close and personal and licking all over his owner’s neck.

Finally, Cas backs up, stepping over Dean’s body and looking down at him expectantly.

Dean sits up, a hand going up to his neck and coming away damp. “Damn it, Cas,” he mutters, but there isn’t any heat behind his statement—Cas _did_ prevent him from running straight-on into the lake, so technically he’s a lot less wet right now than he would have been if Cas hadn’t been around.

Then again, if it weren’t for Cas, Dean wouldn’t have been charging down that hill like an idiot, anyway.

“All right, let’s go back to the car,” Dean says.

Looking up the hill, he sighs. It’s gonna be a long climb. Freakin’ Cas.

* * *

Dean’s prediction proves to be true—he pulls into a parking space outside Sam’s apartment at five thirty, just in time to go in and mooch dinner.

Maybe.

He hasn’t talked to Sam in a while. It’s been over a year since Sam left, telling Dad that if he didn’t register with the government, then that’d be it—Sam was done hiding from the police, and if he couldn’t go out on the street without feeling guilty about what his family was doing, then he didn’t want anything to do with them anymore.

Dean gets it. He knew Sam was in the right even back then, but he’d cared too much about family, thought that Sam would come back after running off for a few days.

Now, he and Sam have drifted apart, and he doesn’t feel like they’ll be able to go back. Sam and Dad… well, Dean’s just gonna try not to think about that. Dad’s got his fair share of issues, sure, and Dean isn’t completely fine with him either, but he’s not about to freakin’ _abandon_ the guy who raised him.

Dean gets out of the car and looks up at the apartment building as he pushes the door shut. Maybe he should call Sam before going straight up.

Cas lands next to him.

“Hey,” Dean says. “We’re going up to see my brother, Sam. He’s uh, he won’t be like my dad, I promise.”

Cas looks doubtful, but he walks toward the entrance to the building without hesitation. Dean watches him take a few steps before following.

A girl opens the door just as Dean reaches it, and her eyes widen in surprise. “Oh!” she says, a hand flying to her chest.

“Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you,” Dean says, grabbing onto the door handle and stepping back to let her pass. She doesn’t move, though, and he notices that she’s looking at Cas. “You don’t have to be scared. He doesn’t bite.”

Cas turns his head toward Dean, fixing him with a look of contempt, but Dean just shrugs his shoulders.

“Are you a hunter?” the girl asks. When Dean doesn’t answer immediately, she hurries to say, “I mean, I just assumed, because he has a collar, so…”

“Yeah, I’m a hunter,” Dean says. “Off the job right now, though, so don’t worry. I’m just visiting a friend.”

“Oh, okay,” the girl says, relaxing.

“I’ll uh… see you around, then,” Dean says, trying to smooth over the awkward pause.

“Right, yeah,” the girl says, laughing a little, and then she’s heading out toward the street.

When Dean looks over at Cas, he seems amused, and Dean just shakes his head and gestures for Cas to go inside. The tiger steps past Dean nice and slowly, tail flicking back and forth, and Dean follows him in. They take the elevator up to the fourth floor, and thankfully, no one is in the hallway when they get out. Dean walks down the hall to room 403 and knocks.

There’s no response, and Dean frowns, knocking again.

When there’s still no response, Dean glances down at Cas, but the tiger doesn’t seem to be in any discomfort. Either there’s nothing wrong, or Cas can’t sense the threat.

Dean’s just lifting his hand to knock again when the door swings open to reveal a pretty blonde in a too-large t-shirt and baggy sweatpants. Dean just stares for a moment, because that is definitely _not_ Sam, and then the girl’s eyes shift away from Dean, and she takes a tiny step back, probably because she’s just noticed that there’s a tiger on her doorstep.

“Um—hi,” she says.

“Yeah, I’m sorry,” Dean says—is there any possibility that he could’ve remembered the wrong room number? “I uh, I must’ve knocked on the wrong—”

“Dean?”

Dean’s voice trails off at the familiar voice, and then a large hand curls around the edge of the door, pulling it open wider, and— _there_. “Sam,” Dean says, relieved. “God, I thought I’d gotten the wrong room or something.”

“What are you doing here?” Sam asks, and as expected, he doesn’t sound like he’s happy to see Dean.

“Chill. I got a companion,” Dean says.

“You’re a hunter,” the girl observes. “Sam, you never said your brother was a hunter.”

“I didn’t think it was important,” Sam says, sparing a glance at his friend—girlfriend?—before turning his attention back on Dean, gaze speculative. “Uh, come on in.”

The blonde backs out of the way, and Dean steps forward, scuffing his shoes on the welcome mat before entering the room. Cas hesitates before following, and Sam pushes the door closed behind them.

“You want anything to drink? Beer?” the girl asks.

Dean grins. “You twenty-one, kid?” he teases.

She arches one eyebrow and replies, “Name’s Jess.”

“All right, I’ll have a beer,” Dean says.

“And your companion?”

“He’s fine,” Dean answers.

Jess walks into the kitchen, which is still visible from the small living room, and Sam grabs Dean by the lapel, pulling him close. Cas lets out a warning growl, but Dean holds a hand out to stop him.

“What the hell, man?” Sam asks in an undertone, mouth right next to Dean’s ear. “Are you and Dad legit now? Is that why you’ve got a companion?”

Meanwhile, from the kitchen, Jess calls, “So what are you doing in town, Dean?”

“Oh, I’m just dropping by to visit Sammy here,” Dean says, smiling as he gives Sam a gentle shove, putting some distance between them. Sam looks furious.

But Jess is back with three beers in hand, and she passes one each to Dean and Sam before twisting the cap off her own. “That’s nice,” she says. “I haven’t heard much about Sam’s family.”

“I haven’t heard much about you,” Dean responds, taking a drink from his bottle. “So, are you two…?”

“Dating,” Jess answers. Eyes returning to Cas, she says, “So, a companion. I’ve met one before, but she was in human form at the time. I’ve never seen one in animal form, so up close.”

“Yeah, I was against getting one at first,” Dean says.

“Why? They sound like they’d be a lot of help,” Jess says.

“I guess I wanted to prove myself, or some other stupid thing. But then I figured I needed the backup,” Dean answers, and he doesn’t miss the way Sam flinches at the blow. Looking down at Cas, Dean says, “Okay, this is my brother, Sam, and this is his girlfriend, Jess.”

Cas gives Dean a condescending look, and right—he could understand every word of their conversation.

“Well?” Dean says. “Do your imprinting thing.”

Jess giggles at that, and Cas turns his large eyes on her. She quiets down as the tiger approaches, eyes widening a little.

“Is he safe?” Sam asks, frowning.

“Yeah,” Dean answers. “Don’t worry.”

Cas butts Jess’s hand with his nose, and she draws it back, probably a reflexive action. So Cas nudges at her leg with the top of his head, rumbling low in his throat.

“Pet him,” Dean says.

Jess follows Dean’s instruction, and she relaxes visibly when Cas makes a purring sound and arches into the touch. “Oh, wow. His fur is really soft.”

“Yeah,” Dean answers, an inexplicable surge of pride welling up in his chest—it’s not as though he’s got anything to do with the softness of Cas’s fur, Jesus.

Then Cas is pulling away from Jess and walking over to Sam, head tilted farther up than usual to meet Sam’s eyes because Dean’s brother is a freakin’ giant. Glancing over at Sam, Dean sees that he looks a little nervous.

“Isn’t he supposed to be lowering his head in submission or something?” Sam asks, and Cas pretty much answers that question for him by letting out a menacing growl. “Okay, maybe not,” Sam says quickly.

Cas stops right in front of Sam and sniffs at the air near Sam’s knees and thighs before turning his head to press his nose against Sam’s hand. Sam doesn’t pull away, just lets Cas nose at his hand, and Dean feels like yanking Cas away from him, which—well, shit, he’s jealous.

Sam brings his other hand around to pet the back of Cas’s head, and the tiger doesn’t react except to close his eyes. Then he huffs softly and backs away to stand beside Dean.

“So uh, why isn’t he in human form?” Sam asks. “Is he hurt?”

“No,” Dean answers. “He uh, he’s different, is all.”

“Different,” Sam repeats skeptically.

“Does he understand everything we’re saying? Or does he only listen to you?” Jess asks.

“He understands everything,” Dean answers.

“How can you be sure if he can’t communicate with you?” Sam asks.

“I can just tell,” Dean says.

Jess takes a few steps over and squats down in front of Cas. “Don’t you get lonely in there?” she asks, lifting a hand to scratch behind Cas’s left ear.

Cas rumbles at the sensation and shifts forward, pressing the top of his head to Jess’s cheek.

“Dean, mind if we talk outside?” Sam says.

“Uh, no,” Dean says. He starts to turn back toward the front door, but Sam grabs his arm and pulls him in the other direction, and Dean remembers that Sam’s one-bedroom apartment has a small balcony.

Once outside, Sam pushes the sliding glass door closed and turns to Dean.

“I know what you’re gonna ask, and no,” Dean says, bracing himself for the look of disappointment he’s going to see on his little brother’s face.

Sure enough, Sam looks let-down. “How’d you get your hands on a companion, then? Is that—is that why he’s not shifting? Because—”

“No,” Dean interrupts. “I got him directly from Carver Edlund, and the doc himself said he didn’t know what was up with Cas.”

“Huh,” Sam says. “How’d you swing that?”

“The guy owed Dad for saving his life,” Dean says.

Sam tenses up at the mention of Dad. “How is he?” he asks, tightlipped.

“He’s okay,” Dean answers. “Hunting as usual.”

“Did he already meet Cas?”

Dean hovers on the verge of telling Sam what happened, but… well, it wouldn’t help relations between Sam and Dad, so he holds his tongue. “Yeah. He was satisfied.”

“Even though Cas didn’t shift?”

“Yeah,” Dean repeats.

“I’m surprised,” Sam says, brows raised. He turns away to lean his elbows on the railing, looking out at the buildings across the street. “It’s… it’s nice to see you again.”

His voice is softer now, and Dean wonders if this is how it’s always gotta be between him and his family members—they can only say things like this when they’re not looking him in the eyes. Dad had to do it over the phone, and Sam, Sam’s turned away right now.

Ignoring the thought, Dean copies Sam’s position and responds, “Yeah, man. It’s been a while. How’s school? You nerding it up okay?”

Sam chuckles. “Yeah. I’m doing fine.”

“Looks like. Was Jess wearing one of your old shirts?” Dean asks, grinning.

“Shove it, Dean,” Sam says, and it may be dark enough that Dean can’t see his brother’s complexion, but he just _knows_ that Sammy is blushing. “What is Cas like?” Sam asks then, and Dean can’t help but laugh at the abrupt topic change.

“Y’know what, he’s the worst,” Dean says, deciding to let Sam off the hook for now. “Cas is like that son of a bitch tiger in _The Jungle Book_.”

“Who, Shere Khan?” Sam says, scoffing. “Hardly, Dean. He’s around to protect you, isn’t he?”

“Okay, so maybe he isn’t Shere Khan, but he’s not exactly Rajah, either.”

Sam laughs. “You don’t know the tiger from _The Jungle Book_ , but you can name Princess Jasmine’s pet tiger right off the top of your head.”

“Oh, fuck you,” Dean says, sliding the glass door open and stepping back into the apartment.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I may have pumped this chapter out because [someone](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Flux/) mentioned this fic in the comments of another one of my fics, and I started feeling uber guilty xD But this is as far as I've planned the fic starting from the beginning. I have a destination in mind, but I'm a wee bit hazy as to how we're gonna get there...

Jess sends them off the next morning with a Tupperware container filled with sugar cookies. Sam just tells Dean not to eat them all at once—naturally, Dean responds by giving him the finger, and then he drives away. In the rearview mirror, he sees Cas take off, and Sam and Jess are left standing in the parking lot with matching looks of awe and disbelief.

Cas is _awesome_.

Now if only he would actually _talk_ to Dean…

But there’s really not much Dean can do about it. Maybe if Dean stops asking, Cas will decide to shift on his own, one day.

Yeah, fat chance.

Dean looks out at the road ahead and lets his mind wander. He’s got no more family to introduce to Cas, so he figures he may as well head out to West Virginia, check out what Chuck might have seen there and maybe meet up with Dad. Last night, Dean borrowed Sam’s laptop to look at the news and weather reports, but he didn’t see anything that screamed demonic interference at him. Still, Chuck is supposed to be some sort of an expert, and if he thinks demons are involved, there’s a chance that they are.

About four hours into the drive, he reaches Reno and stops to grab lunch. He’s still looking at the menu when his phone rings. Dean checks the caller ID before picking up and saying, “Hey, Bobby.”

“Dean,” Bobby says. “You seen Sam yet?”

“Yep.”

“Ellen told me what John did.”

“It’s fine,” Dean says. “He—”

“The hell it’s fine!” Bobby barks. “The next time I see him, my finger might just slip on the trigger.”

“Bobby,” Dean says tiredly. “Look, he’s still my dad. And he apologized, which is… y’know, not normal. Anyway, I’m fine, and Cas is fine, so—”

“Speaking of Cas, how is he? Still all jungle cat and no human?”

“Unfortunately, yeah,” Dean answers. A waitress pauses by his table, and he points to Combo Number 3 on the menu, mouthing _thank you_ before she leaves.

“Well, at least we know his protective instincts are working, thanks to your psychotic bastard of a father,” Bobby grumbles.

“Yeah, there’s that,” Dean concedes.

“Are you feeling up to a case, then?” Bobby asks. “Got a potential one in Delta, Colorado. Should be maybe a fifteen, sixteen hour drive from Stanford.”

“I’m actually in Reno right now,” Dean answers.

“Oh. Even closer, then. How about it?” But before Dean can answer, Bobby goes on, “There’s a family of eight, the Avery family, made up of the happy couple, one of the grandparents, and five kids. Just moved into town last month. The oldest kid died two weeks ago, the second oldest died last week, and—”

“Let me guess: the third kid died this week,” Dean says.

“Just yesterday,” Bobby confirms. “So, you gonna take the case?”

“Yeah, I’ve got the time. You sure there aren’t any other hunters already on it?” Dean asks.

“Haven’t seen any trackers heading that way,” Bobby says.

“Okay, then,” Dean says. “I’m just gonna eat, and then I’ll head that way. Should be there by tonight.”

“All right,” Bobby says. “Just don’t get yourself into trouble.”

“Don’t worry; I know what I’m doing,” Dean replies.

Bobby hangs up, and Dean puts his phone away. It’s really handy to have Bobby around, he thinks. The guy has an old hacker friend—Hank or Frank, Dean can never remember—who hooked Bobby up with the government systems for tracking registered hunters, so that Bobby can determine whether or not hunts are already being handled. He’s saved Dean from bumping into other hunters more than once in the past year that Dean’s been hunting on his own.

Suddenly feeling restless, Dean flags the waitress over and asks for his order to-go, and a few minutes later, he emerges from the diner with a paper bag. He climbs into the Impala and puts the bag in the passenger seat, looking up at the sky for a moment before starting the car.

Dean drives out of town and down the highway, not stopping to eat ‘til he hits the first rest stop, because he feels like talking, and Cas is his best option, even if he won’t talk back.

Dean’s only been parked for about two minutes when Cas lands outside the driver’s door, wings flickering out of existence as he trots closer. Dean gets out of the car and opens the back door for Cas, and this time he gets in without hesitation.

“So,” Dean says as he digs his burger out of the paper bag, “we’re making a stop in Delta, Colorado for a hunt. What do you say?”

Cas, of course, says nothing, but Dean goes on to explain what little Bobby told him anyway.

It’s probably an evil spirit, Dean thinks, since the family moved in so recently. But he’ll have to check the records for the house’s previous occupants before deciding on that. After listening to Dean talk for maybe ten minutes, Cas just curls up in the backseat and closes his eyes, because he’s an asshole.

When Dean’s done eating, he gets out of the car to toss his trash, and when he gets back, he finds that Cas is breathing slow and even, asleep, so he just starts the car and gets back on the road.

* * *

They arrive in Delta a little after midnight, and Dean finds a motel for them to stay the night. In the morning, after a quick breakfast, Dean heads to the local library to borrow a computer so that he can look up some information on the deaths—they’ll definitely have been covered in the local newspapers.

Cas comes with, sitting down on the ground next to Dean’s chair and attracting a lot of wary looks from the other patrons. Eventually, the librarian, a nice old lady, comes to ask Dean if he can make “his pet” wait outside. Cas growls, which doesn’t help, and Dean ends up taking him outside to wait by the Impala.

He learns that the first kid, a twelve-year-old boy named Jacob, drowned in the bathtub. The second was a nine-year-old girl named Natalie; she apparently fell down the stairs and broke her neck. Last was Carly, a seven-year-old who was crushed to death when a bookshelf fell down on top of her.

If each death had occurred separately, Dean would have written them off as freak accidents, but three in a row, working from the eldest to the youngest? It definitely sounds like something supernatural is going on here.

It’s about ten o’clock when Dean emerges from the library and sees Cas curled up on the sidewalk in front of the Impala, seemingly asleep. But his nose twitches as Dean comes closer, and his eyes flick open. When they land on Dean, Cas gets to his feet and stretches, arching his back and yawning. A man who’s passing by gives him a wide berth and ducks into the library hurriedly.

“Hey, buddy,” Dean says. “I’m gonna go interview the family now, and I don’t think having a tiger around is gonna help them feel safer, so uh, unless you’re going human, you’re gonna have to stay clear of me for a while.”

Cas blinks up at him placidly and shifts his shoulders a little, wings appearing above him.

“Just come back to the motel by nighttime, okay?” Dean says. “And don’t go too far away,” he can’t resist adding as Cas flaps his wings once. This makes Cas pause in his motions, head tilting just a bit as he considers Dean, and yeah, okay, maybe Dean’s worried about him wandering off on his own in a town that doesn’t seem to have seen many hunters before.

But before Dean can say anything else, Cas leaps into the air, flapping his huge wings forcefully to gain altitude. Dean watches him fly over the library and out of sight, and he wonders what Cas is gonna do. Maybe he’ll go hunting for food—he hasn’t left Dean’s side since the rest stop yesterday, and when Dean tried to feed him, he’d turned his nose up at the offer and hopped up onto Dean’s bed to sleep.

Shrugging, Dean gets into the Impala and drives out of the library parking lot.

A few minutes later, Dean pulls up in front of the Avery house and parks his car, looking out the window at the place. It’s a pretty big house, looks like it would fit a family of eight just fine, and at a glance, it doesn’t seem any different from the other houses on this street.

Dean checks that his EMF meter is still powered up before shoving it back into the inner pocket of his jacket and getting out of the car. He goes up to the front door, looking around as he does—the lawn looks fine, the potted plants on the porch look fine, so there’s no immediate sign of evil around the place. Straightening his jacket, Dean reaches out and knocks on the door.

A few minutes later, a woman, probably in her late thirties, opens the door. “Hello,” she says.

“Hi,” Dean says, flashing a quick smile. “My name is Henry Bonham. Are you Mrs. Avery?”

“I am. What is this about?”

“I’m here about the deaths of your son and daughters,” Dean says. He sees the confusion in the woman’s eyes transmute into worry, and he hurries to add, “I’m a hunter. I only want to help you.”

“Can I see your badge?” Mrs. Avery asks.

Dean nods and reaches into his pocket to show the fake badge that serves as his permit to hunt. She seems reassured by that and steps back, pulling the door open wider to let him in. Dean enters the house, and she directs him to the right, into a small living room.

“Here, sit,” she says, gesturing toward a couch. “Would you like some water, or—”

“No, I’m fine,” Dean answers, taking the indicated seat. “I just wanted to ask—”

The sound of crying starts up, interrupting him, and he looks around, frowning. He’s never heard of a crying angry spirit before.

“I’m sorry,” Mrs. Avery says, getting to her feet. “That’ll be one of the twins. I’ll be right back.”

As she exits the room, Dean notices the baby monitor sitting on top of a cabinet and relaxes a little. He gets to his feet then, pulling out his EMF meter and making a quick circuit of the room. When it doesn’t show any supernatural presence, he wanders over toward the kitchen, but there’s still nothing.

“Oh, is that an EMS meter?” Mrs. Avery asks when she comes back.

“EMF,” Dean corrects, “but yes.”

“You think it’s an evil spirit, then, that’s killing my children?” she asks, taking a deep breath.

“It could be a number of things,” Dean replies, returning to his seat on the couch. “I read that you moved into town recently. Is that true?”

“Yes,” Mrs. Avery answers. “My husband got a job in town, so we bought a house here.”

“Do you know anything about the previous owners?”

“We met them briefly when the realtor took us here to look at the house. They seemed like nice people.”

“Okay,” Dean says. “Can I take a look at uh, at the places where…”

Mrs. Avery looks away. “Do you think my twins are at risk?” she asks, fingers twisting in her lap.

“If there really is something supernatural here at work, then yes,” Dean says quietly.

“I tried calling the police about it,” Mrs. Avery says. “But they said that they didn’t think it was anything supernatural.”

“But what do _you_ think?” Dean asks. When the woman doesn’t reply, Dean continues, “What does your gut tell you?”

“I don’t know,” Mrs. Avery says. “But since you’re already here… I can’t take any chances with my boys.”

“So you’re willing to cooperate with my job, then,” Dean says.

“Yes. What do you need from us?”

“Well, I haven’t confirmed that there’s anything going on right now, but I think it’d be best if you and the rest of your family moved out to a hotel for a day or two while I check out the house,” Dean says.

Mrs. Avery nods. “I’ll uh, I’ll give my husband a call to see what he thinks, and then I’ll get back to you. Until then, you can look around the rest of the house.”

“All right. Thanks for cooperating.”

* * *

About half an hour later, Mrs. Avery is packed and ushering an old woman down the steps and toward the front door. Dean moves to open it for her, and Mrs. Avery thanks him. She asks that he help her carry one of the twins out to the car, so he goes upstairs with her.

Less than five minutes after that, the Averys drive away, and Dean closes and locks the front door.

The first order of business is to do a thorough sweep of every room in the house, looking for cursed objects or just the presence of an evil spirit. But he gets no EMF readings, so he puts the meter away and sits down at the kitchen table to think for a moment.

The three deaths were technically all different—drowning, falling, and being crushed—so it’s unlikely that this was some sort of a supernatural creature. In fact, that reasoning is probably why no hunters decided to pick this up as a case.

As Dean thinks, he feels a strange tickle in his throat and coughs once. But the tickle is still there, and he coughs again, and again.

Okay, water. Water might help.

He goes over to the sink, grabbing a cup that’s sitting on the counter, and reaches for the faucet, but he doubles over in the next moment, succumbing to a coughing fit. Dean manages to set the cup back down on the countertop, bringing a hand to his mouth as he coughs.

There’s liquid in his palm, and when he pulls it away from his mouth, he sees blood.

_Shit_.

It hasn’t been a week since the last death, so this can’t be some sort of a ritual thing, Dean thinks even as he stumbles back, resting one hand on the table to try and steady himself.

He coughs harder, enough that it’s difficult to catch his breath, and then suddenly he’s choking, spraying blood across the kitchen tiles as he drops to his knees.

What was a tickle now feels as though he was just stabbed in the neck.

“Fuck—fuck, Cas—” he gets out, blood dripping to the ground as he speaks, but what the hell kind of use would a tiger be in this sort of situation?

He can hear someone banging on the front door, but he can’t get to his feet, wiping weakly at his mouth and trying to breathe. More blood comes up instead, and Dean starts to feel lightheaded, and god, _really?_ Is this seriously how he’s gonna die?

And then there’s a bang, muffled to Dean’s ears because he’s still coughing his lungs up.

Moments later, hands are grabbing at him, at his jacket, and he clutches at someone’s arm briefly before they pull away, tugging something out of one of his pockets.

A small burst of flame.

Dean coughs a few more times, more blood coming out of his mouth, and when he goes to draw a breath, his throat is blessedly _clear_. Air rushes into his lungs, and he flops back against the kitchen cabinets near the ground, chest heaving.

Someone kneels in front of him, grasping his shoulders and tilting his head upward, and Dean catches sight of blue, blue, _blue_. Stubbled jaw, angled cheekbones and nose, and large, concerned eyes. Dean blinks a few times before just closing his eyes, catching his breath.

“You’re all right,” he realizes the man is saying, palpable relief in his voice.

It’s too much, Dean thinks. This is maybe the third time he’s almost died in the past five—six?—days.

“You’re all right,” the man repeats.

Dean opens his eyes then and frowns, because this face is familiar. And then he says, “Jimmy?”

The stranger—and it _is_ Jimmy, there’s no mistaking it—smiles wryly. “Mr. Mosely,” he responds, and Dean laughs, still a little breathless.

“How the hell did you—” he starts, and then his gaze drops to the ground, and he notices the charred remains of what looks like a hex bag. “How did you know to do that?”

“I happen to share your profession.”

Dean frowns at him. “How’d you know where the hex bag was? No, wait—how’d you even know there was a hex bag in the first place?”

“It was the only logical conclusion. As for its location, I realized that it had not been a full week since the third Avery child died, so the hex bag had to be on your person, rather than inside the house.”

“And how’d you know I was here?”

“I may have followed you from the library,” Jimmy says, smiling ruefully.

“Huh.” And then Dean says, “Let me see some ID,” which is something he never thought he’d be the one to say.

Jimmy pulls a badge out of his pocket and shows it to Dean. The man in the picture is definitely him, and the name underneath says _James Novak_. “But let’s not kid ourselves. This badge isn’t real, and neither is yours,” Jimmy says as he puts it away.

“You’re unregistered,” Dean says as he sees Jimmy lift up a familiar badge.

“And _you_ are not Alonso Mosely. Nor, I suspect, are you Henry Bonham.”

Dean huffs and snatches his badge back with his clean hand, shoving it into his pocket. “Dean,” he says.

Jimmy’s eyebrows scrunch together, and he says, “Pardon?”

“My name is Dean. You saved my life—I figure you’ve earned my real name.”

“Ah, I see.”

Jimmy doesn’t continue, so Dean asks, “Well aren’t you gonna tell me your real name?”

“Maybe when _you’ve_ saved _my_ life,” Jimmy responds, grinning. “Now go get yourself cleaned up. I’m gonna do something about the floor.”

“Yeah, okay,” Dean says, getting to his feet and starting toward the bathroom. When he looks back over his shoulder, Jimmy is pulling some bleach out of the cupboard under the sink.

Dean goes into the bathroom and washes his hands, rinses his mouth out, and cleans off his chin. As he looks at himself in the mirror, he wonders where Cas is. He doesn’t know exactly how Cas is able to tell whenever Dean wants him around, but Dean almost _died_ —shouldn’t he be here right now?

There are a few spots of blood on his left sleeve, and he tries to wash them out at least a little.

When he emerges from the bathroom and returns to the kitchen, he finds Jimmy on his knees, scrubbing at the ground. Is it a coincidence, meeting up with Jimmy here? The guy hadn’t had a car when Dean saw him at the Roadhouse, so it isn’t as though he could have followed Dean to Stanford and then from Stanford to Delta… could he?

“Enjoying the view?” Jimmy says.

Dean chuckles and goes to sit at the kitchen table. “Why didn’t you say that you were a hunter when we met at the Roadhouse?”

“I’d never met you before,” Jimmy says, pausing to look up at Dean. “For all I knew, you could have been a registered hunter, one of the guys who reports guys like us. Not gonna lie—I had a run-in with Gordon Walker just a little over a week ago. It was a close call.”

“Ah, Gordon,” Dean says. He’s only heard of the guy, but he’s well-known for being a ruthless hunter, especially of vampires. He’s also known for complete intolerance for unregistered hunters.

“Yes,” Jimmy says. “He was the reason why I had to ditch my car.”

“Hmm,” Dean says. “So did you come here for the case, or…?”

“I happened to be passing through yesterday and read about the murders in the local paper. Thought I’d stick around for a while, see if anything suspicious was going on,” Jimmy answers.

“Have you interviewed the family yet, then?”

“No, but I assume you have,” Jimmy says, resuming his scrubbing. His sleeves are rolled up to his elbows, and Dean can’t help but eye the play of muscles in his forearms as he works. Jimmy continues, “I saw you when you were leaving the library and guessed that you would be coming here next. Took me some time to get here, though, since I don’t have a car.”

Frowning, Dean recalls, “I’m pretty sure I locked the front door.”

“I’m pretty sure you’ve kicked in many a door yourself,” Jimmy says primly. “In any case, I doubt the Averys will be crying over a single kicked-in door after we find the witch responsible for the deaths of three of their children.”

“Right,” Dean says. “Okay, so if it’s a witch… I’ll check the house for hex bags. And then we should probably call the Averys, see if they’ve got any enemies.”

Jimmy just nods, and Dean exits the room, planning to start upstairs and work his way down.

* * *

“I don’t understand,” Jimmy says a few hours later, when they’re sitting down to lunch at a diner. “If you have a companion, why didn’t it sense that you were in danger when you were dying?”

Dean shrugs. “Who the hell knows? Maybe he was out of range?”

“Is that a thing that happens?” Jimmy asks. “I thought they were intimately connected to their masters.”

“I have no clue,” Dean says. “I only told him to be back by nighttime, so maybe he took the day off.”

Jimmy looks doubtful but doesn’t pursue the topic, choosing instead to take a sip of his water.

“So, how do you know Jo and Ellen?” Dean asks. “I assume you were looking for them, when you went to the Roadhouse.”

“Oh, y’know, I heard about them the normal way. Ran into another hunter one time, a registered one, and he didn’t figure out that I wasn’t registered. He told me that Harvelle’s Roadhouse was a good place for collecting information, so I went to see if it was true,” Jimmy replies. “You?”

“My dad was friends with Ellen and her husband,” Dean says.

“Mm. So your father’s in the business, too?”

“Yeah,” Dean answers. “My grandpa on my mom’s side is a hunter too, so I guess it comes from both sides of the family.”

“Oh,” Jimmy says, surprised. “Are you all unregistered?”

“Nah, my mom’s side is registered. Dad and I aren’t.”

“Interesting. Doesn’t your mother have anything to say about that?”

“My mom’s dead.”

Jimmy’s eyes go wide, and then he looks contrite. “I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s fine,” Dean says, but the silence that falls afterwards feels awkward, stilted, and Dean takes a long drink from his beer bottle. Then he asks, “Why are you unregistered?”

Jimmy looks at him sharply. “Personal reasons,” he says. “I imagine you don’t want other people asking for your reasons.”

“Touché,” Dean says, tipping the bottle in Jimmy’s direction.

The waitress arrives with two plates laden with food then, and Dean sets his beer down with a grin, rubbing his palms together in anticipation.

They don’t talk much over their burgers and fries, but it’s a much less uncomfortable silence than before, and Dean finds himself wondering why Jimmy got into hunting in the first place. But judging from his reaction when Dean asked him why he was unregistered, asking about his past probably wouldn’t get a better response.

When they’re polishing off the last of their fries, the waitress reappears. “Can I get any dessert for you boys?” she asks with a small smile.

“What kind of pie are you serving today?” Dean asks.

“We always have apple, cherry, and peach. Today’s special is boysenberry,” the waitress answers, pulling out a small notepad. “Which will it be?”

“I’ll take one slice of the special, then,” Dean says. “Jimmy?”

“Oh. I…” Jimmy says, looking uncertain.

“It’s fine if you don’t want any,” Dean says.

“Which would you recommend?” Jimmy asks the waitress. “Or rather—which is your favorite?”

“I’d say peach,” she replies. “Would you like a slice of that?”

“Yes, please.”

“All right. I’ll be right back,” the waitress says, walking away.

Dean waits until she’s gone before saying, “Dude, you sounded like you never had pie before.”

Jimmy shrugs. “Would you think less of me if it were the truth?”

Dean’s about to answer when his phone goes off, and as he pulls it out, he says, “Hold that thought.” The caller ID says that it’s Samuel, and he frowns as he picks up. “Hello?”

“Dean,” Samuel says in an urgent tone, and Dean immediately sits up straighter.

“What?”

“It’s—it’s John. I got a call asking for backup, and when I got here—he’s in a bad way, boy.”

“ _What?_ You’ve gotta be kidding me. How—”

“Just… come. He’s in the hospital, and the doctors are working, but I don’t know how long he’s got,” Samuel says. “We’re at Hampshire Memorial Hospital—Hampshire County, West Virginia. I’ll give you more details when you’re close.”

“Yeah, okay,” Dean says. “I’ll head right over.” He hangs up with that and pockets his phone before digging into his other pocket for his wallet.

“What’s wrong?” Jimmy asks, concerned.

“I need to go—emergency. I’m sorry,” Dean says.

“Oh, it’s fine.”

“You’ve got this case down, right?”

“I’ve got a lead, right?” Jimmy returns with a small smile—he and Dean had learned from Mrs. Avery that they’d recently gone through two babysitters, and one of them was a librarian. They haven’t confirmed it yet, but Dean’s pretty sure it was the librarian from earlier today; that would certainly explain how the hex bag got into his jacket.

“Okay,” Dean says, flipping his wallet open and taking out two twenties to put on the table.

“Dean, this is too much money for your portion,” Jimmy says.

“Dude, you’re hitchhiking, and you saved my life. The least I can do is treat you to lunch,” Dean points out. After a pause, he pulls out a pen and writes his number down on a napkin. “I don’t really believe in coincidences, and we’ve already run into each other twice—I’ve got a feeling we should probably stay in touch.”

Jimmy accepts the napkin with a small smile. “I’ll see you again, then, Dean.”

“Yeah,” Dean says, nodding.

He hurries out of the diner and to the Impala. Getting behind the wheel, he starts the car and prioritizes to keep calm. He needs to get back to the motel and pack.

Hopefully Cas will already be there, but if not… well, he should be able to catch up to Dean, right? Maybe he’ll give Chuck a call if Cas doesn’t show up, just to double-check.

He considers giving Sam a call… but better wait ‘til he actually knows whether or not Dad will be okay.


	6. Chapter 6

Dean drives out of Delta by one o’clock in the afternoon. Thankfully, Cas had been back in front of the motel room when he got there, just waiting for him. He’d packed hurriedly and hopped into the car, telling Cas that Dad was hurt and that they were gonna go see him in West Virginia.

He’s on the road for twelve straight hours, stopping only to fill up on gas and beef jerky. When he finally pulls over at one in the morning, in the parking lot of a motel near Kansas City, Missouri, he’s stiff and tired and needs to get some sleep. As predicted, Cas doesn’t turn human at Dean’s request—if Cas could just take over driving for a couple hours, Dean could get some sleep, and they’d keep moving.

But since Cas doesn’t change, Dean goes ahead and books a room, intending to collapse onto the bed and get up in four hours.

Before he can fall asleep, he decides to give Samuel a call—it’s been long enough that they should be done operating on Dad, and Samuel should be able to tell him how it went. The phone rings out though, and it makes sense that the old man would be sleeping, this late at night. Dean sets his phone down on the nightstand and goes to lie down, but before he’s even fully horizontal, his phone goes off.

“Sorry, Dean,” Samuel says when Dean answers the phone. He sounds weary.

“Hey no, I uh, I forgot about the time,” Dean replies, sitting up in bed. “Look, I just wanted to know how my dad’s doing.”

“Well, there’s… there’s good news and bad news,” Samuel says. “The good news is that he’s pulled through the surgery, and there’s very little chance that he’ll die. The bad news is that the doctors claim he should have woken up two hours ago, and the fact that he hasn’t… well, they’ve got some tests to run, but they don’t know when or if he’s ever gonna wake up.”

“Aw, shit,” Dean curses.

“I’m sorry, son,” Samuel says. “The doctors are saying that it was a heart attack, but I don’t buy it—it had to be something supernatural. I was just wondering… do you have any idea what John might’ve been hunting here?”

“No.”

“It’s just that I worry about him, and I think I’d be better able to find out what’s wrong with him if I know what he was hunting,” Samuel goes on.

“I get that,” Dean says. “But it doesn’t change my answer.”

Samuel sighs. “All right. Well, I’m staying in town, but give me a call when you’re close to the hospital—I’ll meet you there.”

“‘Kay. Thanks, Samuel.”

Dean hangs up then and rubs his eyes, tired. Cas’s furry head pops up over the edge at the foot of the bed, and then he leaps up gracefully, prowling up along Dean’s right.

“Y’know, you’d be making yourself very useful if you turned human and took over driving while I caught up on sleep,” Dean says. “We’d make better time.”

Cas just drops down onto his belly next to Dean, purring and radiating warmth like a giant space heater, and Dean sighs.

“Yeah, okay,” he says, lifting one hand to brush it through the fur on the top of Cas’s head, letting it rest just at the back of Cas’s neck—god, Dean doesn’t think he’ll ever get over how _lush_ Cas’s coat is. “It was worth a try,” he finishes, closing his eyes. “Night, Cas.”

The tiger lets out a low rumble in response, and Dean smiles a little.

* * *

Dean wakes at five o’clock in the morning, before the sun’s even risen, and rushes Cas out of the room. He spends the entire day on the road, stopping only for gas and quick snacks, and he doesn’t see Cas until he actually gets to Hampshire Memorial Hospital, pausing outside because Cas is gonna need to be with Dean in order to get into the hospital.

“C’mon, you son of a bitch, where _are_ you?” Dean mutters under his breath.

And then Cas appears from behind a clump of tall trees in the distance, flying toward Dean at high speed. He lands gracefully at Dean’s feet, and Dean instantly turns to go into the hospital.

“Dean!”

Ah, Samuel, Dean thinks, half-turning to see his grandpa approaching. “Hey,” Dean says. “Thanks for looking after my dad.”

“He’s still my son, even if I don’t really agree with his methods. It was the least I could do,” Samuel replies, moving toward the hospital. Dean goes to follow him, making sure Cas stays close. Samuel says, “That companion yours?”

“Yeah,” Dean answers. “He’s shy.”

“Hmm,” Samuel hums, but he doesn’t sound interested, and Dean’s grateful for it. He’s had enough questions about Cas in the past week, and it’s a nice change for someone to just accept that Cas isn’t in human form.

Samuel leads him over to some stairs and takes them up two flights, emerging in what looks like a normal ward—at least Dad isn’t in the ICU or anything. That’s gotta be a good thing.

“He’s just in here,” Samuel says, stopping in front of a sickroom.

Dean nods and starts to open the door. He pauses before pushing and glances at his grandpa. “You don’t mind waiting outside for a sec, do you?”

“Oh, it’s no problem. Take your time.”

“Thanks.”

Dean enters the room then, allowing Cas to follow him in and then shutting the door behind him. He flicks the lights on—it’s past nine thirty already, and it’s dark out. According to the schedule on the doors, visiting hours usually end right at ten o’clock, so Dean made it just in time.

Dean tears his eyes away from the window shades, forcing himself to look at the sickbed.

Dad is lying on his back, torso slightly elevated, hooked up to a couple machines. One of them is a heart monitor, beeping slowly and steadily, and Dean’s stomach feels like it’s tying itself in knots—Dad’s supposed to be stubborn and irritable and invincible, and seeing him like this is all sorts of wrong. But at least he’s breathing on his own, chest rising and falling evenly.

“Dad,” Dean manages, quiet. He takes one slow step forward, then another, and then hurries the rest of the way to Dad’s bedside, reaching down to grasp the hand that’s closer to him. “Dad, wake up.”

There’s no response, of course, and Dean clenches his jaw against the fear in his chest, the niggling thought that there are tons of people who slip into comas and just never wake up again. Sure, Dean’s had some problems with him, but he’d rather have someone to fight with and yell at than—than _this_.

Something bumps into the backs of his knees, and Dean looks back to see Cas watching him, blue eyes sad and sympathetic. Dean holds out his free hand, and Cas presses the top of his head to it, shifting to Dean’s side and curling his tail around one of Dean’s thighs.

“Thanks, man,” Dean says, grateful that Cas can set aside his grudge against Dad, at least for now.

Dean stands there for a few minutes before returning to the door and opening it for Samuel.

“I’ve never seen anything like it,” Samuel says, closing the door when he’s in the room. “I already checked to make sure it wasn’t djinn poison, and it isn’t African Dream Root, either. I haven’t come up with any other possibilities.”

Dean doesn’t even know what African Dream Root _is_ , to be honest.

“Are you sure you don’t know what your dad might’ve been hunting?”

“I am,” Dean says. “I mean, he told me that he was headed this way, but he didn’t say anything about what he was going after. Sorry.”

“No, _I’m_ sorry,” Samuel responds. “If I were more useful, I would have figured out the problem by now.”

“You’ve done enough,” Dean says, casting a grateful look in his grandpa’s direction.

His relationship with Samuel has always been rocky at best—Samuel’s been trying to convince Dean to get registered for the past year already, and he’s always disapproved of Dad’s choices. It’s good to know that Samuel can still set aside his differences when Dean and Dad really need him.

After a pause, Samuel says, “I have my own number down for the nurses to call if there’s any change in John’s condition. I could have your number added to the list, if you want.”

“Uh, yeah. Yeah, that’d be great,” Dean says, looking back down at Dad.

“I’ll have that taken care of, then.”

“Thanks.”

* * *

A nurse comes by to ask Dean to leave right at ten o’clock, so he takes Cas back out to the Impala and leaves the hospital, cruising to the nearest motel and booking himself a room. After so much time spent on the road, Dean knows that he should try to get some rest, but thanks to Samuel’s questioning, Dean can’t stop thinking about what might have caused Dad’s coma.

So after a half hour of tossing and turning, he gets out of bed and turns on his laptop, intending to do some research on weather in the area. Samuel didn’t know to check for demon omens, but that’s because he didn’t get a tip from Chuck.

Dean still isn’t quite sure why he didn’t mention the phone call from Chuck, but it had just seemed best to keep it a secret. Chuck may have seemed extremely paranoid—a disposable phone, _really?_ —but he’s managed to stay alive this long. And his fears about something dangerous brewing in West Virginia had certainly caused _something_ to happen to Dad, so caution is the name of the game as far as information is concerned.

But after thirty, maybe forty minutes of going through old weather reports and news reports, searching for power outages or abrupt changes in weather, but he’s found nothing that screams _demons_ at him, and he’s beginning to wonder if Chuck really _is_ batshit crazy.

“There’s not one thing that points to demon activity in the area,” Dean says to the black-and-orange pile of fur on the bed. “Not one,” he repeats.

There’s no response, not that he’d expected one.

“Do you think Chuck is crazy, Cas?” he muses. “But then, Samuel seems pretty convinced that it was something supernatural, and if the doctors can’t figure out what’s wrong with Dad, then he’s probably right. But… I don’t know, maybe the demons have learned to hide their tracks?”

Cas lets out a low rumble but doesn’t move from his spot.

Sighing, Dean presses the laptop screen down and pulls out his phone. “Maybe I’ll go into that facility Chuck was talking about when he called.”

This makes Cas’s ears tick upward, and Dean looks at him, interested.

“Hmm,” he says as he realizes that he doesn’t have Jimmy’s number. “Do you think that’s a good idea or a bad one?” he asks, thumbing down to Ellen’s number—she knows Jimmy, so she’ll probably be able to give him his number. He knows the chance that Jimmy’s headed out this way is pretty slim, but it’d still be nice to know how he’s doing.

Cas is quiet, but Dean doesn’t think much of it, pressing the call button and lifting his phone to his ear.

“Dean?” Ellen says when she picks up. She sounds surprised.

“Yeah, hey, Ellen.”

“I’ve been meaning to call and check up on you. How is everything? John hasn’t gone and done something else, has he?”

“No. No uh, this time he got himself into some trouble. It’s—it’s fine. I have it under control. I was actually calling about something else,” Dean says.

“Uh huh,” Ellen says. “Okay, what do you need?”

“I just wanted to check on a friend, but I don’t have his number. Jimmy Novak.”

“Jimmy who?”

“Novak,” Dean repeats.

“And why do you think I would have his number? Is he a hunter?” Ellen asks.

“Uh, yeah,” Dean says, frowning, until he remembers that Jimmy’s careful about his acquaintances, so he’s probably asked Ellen to keep him and his information on lockdown. Dean likes to think that Ellen wouldn’t keep things from him, but if Jimmy really asked for her not to talk about him, he’s sure she’d keep that promise. So he says, “Oh, it’s okay, Ellen, you don’t have to lie. Jimmy already told me that he was unregistered and all, so you don’t need to—”

“I’m not lying, Dean. I’ve never met anyone named Jimmy Novak.”

And then Dean remembers—“Right, Jimmy wasn’t his real name. He was using an alias. Okay, how about… an unregistered hunter, maybe an inch or two shorter than me, dark hair, blue eyes…”

Ellen’s quiet for a moment, thinking, and then she says, “I really can’t think of anyone matching that description. Not anyone whose name and number I would know, anyway.”

“Huh. That’s… weird.”

“How’d you meet the guy?”

Dean shakes his head. “It’s not important, really. I just wanted to check up on him.” After a pause, he says, “You’re sure you’ve never met him? He said he had a run-in with Gordon Walker a couple weeks back, if that rings any bells.”

“Mm, no. Sorry,” Ellen says. She sounds concerned. “Dean—”

“It’s fine,” Dean says. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Do you want me to keep an eye out for him?”

“No. It’s fine,” Dean repeats. “I’ll uh, I’ll call you another time. Okay?”

“Okay,” Ellen says. “Be careful out there, Dean.”

“I know. I will.”

They hang up then, and Dean looks down at his phone, frowning. He should have gotten Jimmy’s number before hurrying out of the restaurant in Delta, but he’d kinda assumed that Jimmy would have called by now, at least to give him an update on the case or something.

He’s surprised by the pang of loss he feels—it’s not as though Jimmy was particularly special to him or anything, just another unregistered hunter with a past he didn’t want to talk about.

Cas nudges his knee then, and Dean lets his hand rest on Cas’s head for a while, petting through the soft fur there. “What, are you comforting me ‘cause I can’t find Jimmy?” Dean asks. “Because y’know, I wouldn’t have to go looking for a partner if you would just shift and help me.”

Cas looks a little sad then, and Dean sighs.

“Yeah, yeah, I got it. Can’t guilt you into shifting,” he says, closing his eyes.

He leans back in his seat, letting his head rest against the wall behind him, and a moment later, something warm and a little heavy rests on his thigh. Opening his eyes a slit, he sees that Cas is resting his head on Dean’s thigh, purring softly.

He’s gonna look up that facility and go there tomorrow morning, see what’s going on. Cas probably disapproves, but he doesn’t get a say, because it’s his own fault that he can’t talk.

Dean sighs. One of these days, man. One of these days.

* * *

Cas glowers at Dean all morning when he says that he intends to go to the government-run facility for companions located some twenty miles away. But Cas still won’t turn human, so Dean won’t change his mind. In the end, Dean parks in front of the place and gets out of the car.

Before shutting the door, he looks at Cas in the backseat and says, “If you’re planning to come save my ass, you’re gonna have to grow yourself some hands.”

Cas growls in protest but stays as furry as always, and Dean shoves the driver’s door closed before walking toward the building. When he glances back over his shoulder, Cas is glaring at him through the rear windshield. Dean waves cheerfully before going inside.

This place seems a lot nicer than the one up in Iron River, and there are a few people passing through the lobby. No one’s waiting in the seats, though, and Dean goes up to the receptionist.

“Hi,” she says with a smile. “How can I help you today?”

“Oh, I was just thinking about taking a look at some companions—not for me, for my friend.”

“Hmm. These things need to be done in person, you know.”

“Yeah, but I figured I’d just take a look around first. We’re pretty close, so I thought I’d be able to give him a good idea of whether or not we can find a companion that’s suitable for him here,” Dean bluffs.

“Okay, then,” the receptionist says. “Well, you’re welcome to go ahead to the viewing room—I’ll have someone help you in a few minutes. It’s down the hall to your right.”

Dean smiles. “Great, thanks,” he says before starting to his right.

A few yards down the hall, the door to the viewing room is clearly labeled. He hesitates a moment and then walks past it, figuring he’s got a couple minutes before they drag some scientist in to deal with him. He tries two other doors farther down the hall and finds them both locked.

At the end of the hallway, Dean turns right and finds the door to an emergency staircase. Pushing through, he sees that the way up is not blocked, but the downward-leading stairs have been fenced off. It’s easy enough to hop over the low gate with the “No Trespassing” sign, and a moment later, Dean reaches basement level. He finds himself in a long hallway, with a few doors along its length. At the closer end of the hall, there’s a set of double doors, and Dean notices that one of the two doors is cracked open.

Curious, he sneaks over and edges it open a tiny bit more, just enough to catch sight of a mirror.

In the reflection, he sees a dark-skinned man, restrained on top of a cot. There are a ton of tubes feeding into what Dean can see of him—his arms, his shoulders, even a few on his neck, and god, that looks painful. People in white coats move around him, but Dean can’t see their faces.

There’s the buzz of an electric current, and the man twitches and jerks, a low moan coming from him. His head lolls to the side, toward the mirror, and Dean catches sight of fangs.

_Vampire_.

His eyes shift a little, and Dean sees that the man—vampire—is _meeting his gaze_.

Shit, shit, shit, he’s been made, by a vampire of all things. But Dean remains frozen in place, because the vamp’s face may seem slightly vacant, mouth slack, but his eyes are surprisingly focused, and Dean can’t look away, just holding his gaze.

One white-coated figure shifts to the side, and Dean sees that the vampire’s stomach might be cut open, and the people in coats are armed with scalpels and tongs. It occurs to Dean that while some of the cords attached to the vamp are electrical, some of them are definitely pumping dead man’s blood into him, keeping him weak so they can cut him open. And yeah, when he moves his head to see a little more of the room in the mirror, he catches sight of vials and vials of dark red liquid.

Dean looks back at the vamp’s eyes in the mirror, and all he sees is a silent plea for help.

Aw, fuck. It’s a monster—a _monster_. It kills people, lives off them. The guys in there with the scalpels are supposed to be the good guys, Dean reminds himself as he scrambles away, slipping silently into the stairwell before racing up the stairs.

Goddamn it, Dean got into the business to kill the evil things that went bump in the night, but he never signed up for _torturing_ them. Why the hell would anyone be torturing vampires anyway? They’ve already figured out how to kill them, so what’s the point of further study?

Thinking back on the sheer number of wires and cords hooked up to the vamp, Dean wonders how the hell it was even conscious. Surely, that amount of dead man’s blood would have paralyzed another vamp by now—it looked like he’d been there for a while. So maybe it’s the alpha vamp. Dean’s heard that registered hunters are required by law to bring in any alphas they capture, alive, because the government has tests that they want to run on the alphas, in the hopes of finding an easier way to exterminate each species of monster.

Yeah, that’s gotta be it. There’s just no way that a normal vamp would have been able to turn and look at Dean, beg for help. But god, even if it’s the alpha, Dean can’t justify that kind of torture in his mind. Monster or not, it’s a living, _feeling_ creature, and Dean can’t help but feel guilty walking out on it.

He just has to forget it ever happened.

Back on the ground floor, Dean gets out of the stairwell and hurries back down the hall he came from. Just as he’s approaching the viewing room, a woman appears from the direction of the lobby, dark-haired and quite a bit shorter than him.

“Hello,” she says, squinting a little. “Where were you just coming from?”

“Oh I uh, was just looking for the bathroom,” Dean says.

“Mhmm. Well, I am Dr. Masters, but you can call me Meg,” the woman says with a smile.

Dean returns the smile, albeit uneasily—there’s something predatory in the glint of her eyes, and he really doesn’t like it. “I’m Henry,” Dean says.

“Okay, Henry,” Meg says, starting to open the door to the viewing room, “let’s take a look inside.”

“Y’know, on second thought, I think it might be better if I just come in with my friend, when he’s in town,” Dean says. “I mean, he’s kinda picky and unpredictable, and it’s hard to say what kind of animal he’ll want for a companion, so having me scope the place out isn’t gonna help all that much.”

“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” Meg says, still smiling as she presses a surprisingly strong hand to Dean’s shoulder and starts steering him into the room. “There’s plenty you can do without him here. You can take a look at the available animals, make a list for him—”

“There’s really no need,” a rough, familiar voice says from the direction of the lobby, and Dean turns in that direction to see Jimmy coming toward him. What the _fuck_ —

“You’re the friend, I presume,” Meg says, releasing Dean and going over to meet Jimmy with her hand extended. They shake hands and make introductions, but Dean’s still a little stuck on how the hell Jimmy can be here, _now_ , when he’s supposed to be finishing up a case in Colorado. There’s just no way he could’ve gotten here so fast—the dude was fucking _hitchhiking_ , for Christ’s sake!

“Henry is indeed a good friend,” Jimmy is saying when Dean tunes back in. “He always attempts to anticipate my needs, but it hardly ever proves necessary. He’s a very thoughtful man.”

“So it seems,” Meg says, giving Dean a knowing look.

Dean just says, “I didn’t expect you to be here so soon.”

“Yes well, I managed to catch an earlier flight,” Jimmy answers. “But please, come with me. I’d like to tell you all about my trip.”

“So you don’t want a companion, after all?” Meg asks.

“No, not at this point,” Jimmy says airily. “Apologies for wasting your time, Dr.… Masters, was it?”

“Yes,” Meg supplies. “But please, call me Meg.” She produces a business card and presses it into Jimmy’s hand with a wink. “And if you change your mind, give me a call. I’ll personally see to it that your needs are met.”

“That’s very kind of you,” Jimmy says, already turning to leave. “Henry?” he says, and Dean hurries after him, flashing a quick smile at Meg as he passes by her.

Once outside, the first thing Dean notices is that the tiger is not in the car anymore, which… shit. The pieces start falling together in his head—Jimmy showing up at the Roadhouse, Ellen having no clue who he is, the ridiculously blue eyes that Dean remembers he’d even fucking _compared to Cas’s_ when they first met—

“Oh, you little shit,” Dean says, cuffing Jimmy— _Cas_ —in the back of the head.

“Please, can this wait until we’re in the car?” Cas says, not slowing in his pace until he’s reached the car and is waiting for Dean to unlock the doors.

As Dean gets into the car, he starts, “This _whole_ time, you’ve been—”

“Dean, please,” Cas says, looking down at the card in his hand as he sits, “this is neither the time nor place for this conversation.” He folds the card in half and tosses it out onto the gravel before pulling the passenger door closed.

“Why’d you do that? I thought she looked pretty into you,” Dean says.

“She’s a demon. Drive.”

Dean’s eyes go wide. “You mean—Meg, that was—she was a _demon?_ ”

“Yes. Now, drive,” Cas says, tense.

“But—”

“If I was able to tell that she was not human, I’m certain that she knew I was not human, either. Can we _please_ leave this place, now?”

“Yeah. Fine. But we’re talking ‘bout this as soon as we’re back at the motel,” Dean says, glaring at Cas before starting the car and getting the hell outta there. Jesus, he just met his first demon, and he didn’t even know it.

* * *

Cas doesn’t actually seem to relax until they’re out of the Impala and back in their motel room, but even then he’s a little twitchy, pacing back and forth and insisting that they leave town.

“We’re not going anywhere until you tell me why the hell you’ve been screwing around with me,” Dean says adamantly.

“I can’t say,” Cas repeats—it was the first thing he’d said when they got into the hotel room. “It’s enough of a risk that I’m even _talking_ to you while you’re aware of my identity. She could be watching. She could be watching anytime, and I wouldn’t even know it. Fuck.”

“Who, Cas?” Dean asks, shivering at the icy feeling that goes down his back at the thought that someone could be spying on them in this moment. “And how?”

“I _can’t say_ ,” Cas grinds out, angry.

Frustrated, Dean says, “Can you tell me _anything?_ Anything at all.”

“I killed the witch responsible for the deaths in Delta, Colorado,” Cas offers.

That’s not exactly what Dean wanted to hear, but it’s good to know, at least. Still, it feels unimportant and irrelevant to everything else that’s going on—he’s just met his first demon and had absolutely no idea. He’d always been so sure that he would somehow just _know_ that he was dealing with a demon, but damn it, she’d just seemed like any other aggressive girl.

“How did you know that Meg was a demon?” Dean asks.

Cas levels Dean with a look that says he’s an idiot, one that Dean’s already pretty damn familiar with, and answers, “Sulfur. I smelled the sulfur. And I still think it’d be for the best if we just left this place. We could transfer your father to another hospital and just _leave_.”

“No,” Dean says. “I can’t let this go, not when we’ve just found proof that there _are_ demons working in the government. Dad’s been spewing this nonsense for years, looking for Mom’s killer, and it finally turns out he’s right—this has _gotta_ be why he’s in a coma right now, y’know what I mean? He must have found something out, something that got him into trouble.”

“I don’t know,” Cas says. “I just want you to be safe.”

“Well yeah, of course,” Dean says, waving the statement away. “You want that because it’s your job to keep me safe. But I’ve got a job to do, too.” At this, Cas just frowns and look away, and Dean says, “That _is_ your job, isn’t it?”

Cas doesn’t confirm or deny it, just repeats, “It’d be safer if you didn’t stay here. Call Bobby and have him send in a different hunter to investigate.”

“No. No, I’m getting to the bottom of this, with or without you,” Dean says, giving Cas a determined look because he won’t let anyone drag him out of here. Damn it, this is the first time a demon has been close enough for him to contact, to _trap_ , and he’s not gonna give up the chance to find out more—more about what they want, what they’re doing here on Earth, why they _killed Mom_.

Cas heaves a long, reluctant sigh. “What do you have in mind?” he asks.

But before Dean can even formulate an inkling of a plan, the door to their room is kicked in. Dean pulls his gun instinctively, but he hasn’t even turned around fully when he’s thrown backwards by an invisible force, slamming into the wall opposite the door and crumpling to the ground. Cas shifts with a roar, crouching protectively over Dean, and between his legs, Dean can see that the figure in the doorway is none other than Meg Masters.

“Cute, Jimmy. That’s real cute,” she comments, leering.

Cas just snarls and rolls his shoulders, like he’s preparing himself for a fight, and Dean starts to push himself up, wishing he had some holy water on him—demons have been out of the picture for so long that Dean’s never actually carried holy water with him. When they get outta here— _if_ they get outta here—that’s something Dean’s gonna have to change.

Five men file into the room from behind Meg, and Cas shifts his weight back and forth, growling lowly.

“Not gonna come quietly, then?” Meg says, tilting her head to the side and smiling widely.

“In your dreams,” Dean says, pointing his gun at her. He knows it’s useless against a demon, but he might as well _try_.

The window a little to Dean’s right shatters abruptly, and he wheels to the side, shooting at the demon that’s jumping in. The last thing he’s aware of before he blacks out is a _really_ loud snarl.


	7. Chapter 7

Dean feels stiff and uncomfortable when he wakes. He can’t really feel his arms, and he’s a little lightheaded, probably because there’s something tied around his neck, making it hard for him to breathe.

He’s vertical, he realizes, and when he plants his feet on the ground, it takes some weight off his shoulders and arms—he’s apparently been hanging by them, strapped up on either side of him, which explains why he can’t feel them. His arms go from no feeling at all to tingly, itchy heat as the blood rushes through his veins, and he grits his teeth against the pain.

When he’s more comfortable, he turns his head to the side and sees Cas in a cage, lying on his side, unconscious. “Shit. Cas!” he hisses, trying to keep his voice down. “Cas?”

No response.

Biting back his worry, Dean tries to stay calm. From here, it looks like Cas is breathing. And they wouldn’t cage a dead companion, right? So Cas is alive. For now, at least.

Looking around, Dean observes that he’s in a room with white walls on the three sides that he can see. No doors or windows are visible from where he is, so he assumes the entrance must be somewhere behind him. There aren’t any clocks, so he can’t tell how long he’s been out, whether it’s night or day.

Fuck, if Meg was the one who got them, then they’re probably back at the facility. Dean would bet anything that this is another room in the basement, just like the one where he saw the alpha vamp.

“So, _you_ are Dean Winchester.”

The voice sends chills up Dean’s spine, fuck. He says nothing, waiting for the man, or demon, to walk into sight.

“They pulled me outta Hell special, just to play with you. Don’t you feel… privileged?”

“Maybe I would if I knew who you were,” Dean says.

“Ah, right,” the man says, finally moving into Dean’s left field of vision. “Seems I can’t blame you for not knowing who I am—I forgot how hush-hush everything is, topside.”

He’s tall, thin, with sparse, dark hair and a bit of scruff. But his eyes, god, his _eyes_ … they’re hollow, something horrifying and inhuman hiding behind them. This is definitely a demon— _has_ to be.

“It’s always so cold up here,” the demon muses, looking around the room, “and so… _clean_.”

He says it like cleanliness is a personal offense to him, and considering where he comes from, maybe it is.

“Y’know, I already have a Winchester of my own back at home,” he says. “But he’s an old soul. Old souls, especially hunters’ souls, are tougher, too stubborn and resilient. You, though. You are young, fresh, _tender_. Oh, can’t wait to be working with you.”

“What the hell are you talking about, you’ve got a Winchester of your own?” Dean demands.

“Oh, kiddo, haven’t you figured that out, yet? Your daddy’s in a coma because someone wanted him to be,” the demon says gleefully. “Someone sent him downstairs, to be with little old me.”

“But who—how—why—”

“Now, now, one question at a time. We’ve got all the time in the world, after all.”

Fuck, so Dad’s soul—Dad’s soul is in _Hell_. But that doesn’t—that doesn’t make any sense. Dean racks his brain for anyone who would make a deal to sell Dad’s soul to Hell, and he honestly can’t think of anyone. Besides, souls can’t just be bargained off like that. People can only sell their own souls. And Dad would never, _ever_ sell his soul.

“Oh, come now, Dean, think a little faster. This is getting boring,” the demon urges.

“If it’s so boring for you, why don’t you just explain it to me?” Dean says.

“Because you’ve gotta _work_ for it, my boy!” the demon responds. “Tell you what: if you figure out what happened to make Daddy’s soul end up in Hell, I’ll tell you my name. I’ll even give you a clue, since you seem to be having trouble getting started. Family members can barter their loved ones’ souls.”

Family members.

Shit, okay, family members.

Dad’s side of the family is practically nonexistent—Dean never met his paternal grandparents because they died before he was born. He was an only child, too. So that leaves Dean and Sam, for the rest of his family. Unless… unless Mom’s side of the family counts too, just through marriage. So—

“Samuel?” Dean tries.

“Ding ding ding!”

“But… but why?” Dean says.

“Why do you think? What could your dear old granddaddy want in exchange for his son-in-law’s soul, hmm? What would he give up _anything_ to get back?”

“Mom,” Dean realizes. Shit, shit, _shit_ —

“Ah, aren’t you a bright little boy?” the demon says, grinning. “The name’s Alastair, and I’ll be your trainer for the foreseeable future, just until you’re properly trained.”

“The hell’s that supposed to mean?”

“Oh, you’ll see soon enough,” Alastair replies. “I have high hopes for you.”

“But—”

“I don’t think so, Dean. We’ve finished tonight’s appetizers. Now, it’s time to wake up that beautiful feline of yours—a magnificent creature, truly. I think he’ll want to be awake for the main course.”

Alastair walks to the side, moving out of Dean’s view for a moment, but he returns immediately with a knife in one hand and a cattle prod in the other. He twirls the knife a few times before sticking it into the wood just above Dean’s head, and Dean only _just_ manages not to flinch.

“That’s for later,” Alastair says with a nasty grin. Then, turning toward the cage with the cattle prod, he adds, “First, I’ve got a wake-up call to make.”

* * *

Alastair works slowly, stopping to talk now and then because he wants to make sure Dean stays lucid, stays with the pain. It’s fucking Hell, being told stuff about how this isn’t even _real_ torture, not when care needs to be taken for Dean not to bleed out.

Apparently, there’s no such thing as dying in Hell, so all forms of torture are fine. You can have your guts spilled all over the floor, and it’ll hurt like—well, _Hell_ , but there’s no death to take the pain away. Just a reset button, so the pain can start all over again.

But since they’re on Earth, Alastair stops when he thinks Dean’s had enough, and leaves the room.

The silence after his departure is a relief, but the pain stays constant for a long time after, bad enough that even breathing feels like torture. He feels slightly faint, but not enough that he’ll _actually_ faint, because as Alastair was so keen to repeat, he was careful not to let Dean lose too much blood.

Alastair hadn’t really touched Cas after shocking him awake with the cattle prod, and when Dean looks over, he sees the great tiger pacing back and forth in the cage, eyeing the bars critically.

“You okay, Cas?” Dean manages, voice a little hoarse.

Cas doesn’t respond, but he does stop his pacing, turning to face Dean with determined eyes. A moment later, there’s a flicker in the air above Cas’s back, and then his wings form, pressed against his back. Dean watches mutely as Cas starts to flap them, a little at a time. They’re restrained by the bars of the cage, unable to move much, and Dean doesn’t understand. Surely Cas doesn’t think he can fly straight through the—

With a low snarl, Cas presses his wings outward against the sides of the cage, and suddenly they press straight through. Dean’s jaw drops, and he can only stare as Cas flaps harder, eyes blazing.

Cas vanishes abruptly, and Dean has hardly enough time to feel shocked before Cas is standing in front of him, in human form, blue eyes just inches away from Dean’s. His hands fly out to grasp the cross that Dean is tied to, holding himself upright as his legs wobble, like they’re about to give out.

“Jesus Christ,” Dean breathes, stunned. “I didn’t—didn’t know that skinwalkers could—”

“They can’t,” Cas grunts, walking to the side. His steps are slightly uneven, as though he’s still a little weak in the knees, but holy shit, Dean still can’t believe Cas just freaking _teleported_ out of his cage.

“But—but how did you—”

“We’ll have time to talk later,” Cas interrupts, and then there’s the sound of a saw against wood, back and forth, back and forth. “Don’t move,” Cas warns, and then Dean feels the support for his right arm going out. Cas shoves the severed block of wood out of the loops of chain binding Dean to it, and the chains fall to the ground.

“Fuck,” Dean hisses, flexing his fingers and bringing his arm around to his front. The bleeding has mostly stopped on his torso, but he’s covered in blood, most of it dried.

Cas repeats the process to free Dean’s left arm, and then he saws in half the post that’s holding Dean upright, careful not to nick Dean’s back as he does. Alastair didn’t really have a chance to start on Dean’s legs, so thankfully, Dean’s able to stand just fine.

Discarding the saw with a clatter, Cas grasps Dean’s wrist and staggers toward the door.

“We need to move,” Cas says.

“Do you know the way out?” Dean asks.

“I have an idea,” Cas replies, pressing a hand to the door. He seems a lot more steady than he was just a few seconds ago, but they’re definitely gonna have a talk about his teleporting powers as soon as they’re outta this hellhole.

“An idea?”

“We’re underground. There should be a stairwell to take us up to ground level, and from there, we just need to exit through the lobby,” Cas says. Glancing at Dean, he shrugs off his jacket and passes it over. “You’re gonna want to put this on, to cover your injuries.”

“Where’d you even get this? I know you guys can’t just magic clothes into existence.”

“I stole them from Ash’s room when we were at the Roadhouse,” Cas says shamelessly as Dean pulls the jacket on. It’s a little tight in the shoulders, but it’ll do. “And as is normal for skinwalkers, the clothing remains in another dimension when I’m in my tiger form.”

“Yeah, okay,” Dean says. He’s never really gotten the whole clothes thing before, but he figures now isn’t really the time to be getting all inquisitive about it. “Let’s get the hell outta here.”

Cas hesitates a moment before pulling the door open. “Just follow me,” he whispers before easing his way out of the room.

Dean follows dutifully, trusting Cas to get them out of this alive. They follow the hallway to the end and turn right, and shit, it looks exactly the same as this one. What if this place is set up like an underground maze? They could be stuck down here ‘til Alastair finds them.

But Cas steps forward confidently, and Dean can only continue to follow him. They make another turn, and it looks like a dead end, until Dean realizes that he recognizes the double doors at the end—this is where he saw the alpha vamp being tortured, which means it’s where the stairs are.

Thank fucking god.

But when they get to the stairwell, Cas just keeps walking, stopping at the double doors.

“Cas? This is the way out,” Dean hisses, hand on the doorknob.

“I can smell a very powerful supernatural creature here, probably an alpha,” Cas says.

“Yeah, I saw a vamp being cut open when we were here before,” Dean responds. “Now let’s go.”

“Not yet,” Cas says, shaking his head. “We could find something out from that vampire.” Dean opens his mouth to protest, but Cas says, “Your father is in a coma because he tried to find out the truth here, isn’t he? Don’t you think we owe it to him to learn more?”

“My dad is in a coma because Samuel made a deal with a demon to get my mom back,” Dean says.

Cas looks surprised, but he recovers quickly. “Regardless, I think we should find out what the demons are doing,” he says. He steps closer to the doors and pushes lightly on one of them.

“Wait, Cas—”

But the door is already swinging inward, and Dean resigns himself to his fate. Hell, Cas was the one who got them out of that room, so Dean figures he can trust the guy’s judgment. Still, his head is spinning a little, and his entire upper body hurts. The sooner he gets out of here, the sooner he can just lie down for a while and rest. Maybe sleep a while.

They enter the room, and none of the things Dean saw last time are here—no people in white coats, no operating table, nothing except a huge cage with thick bars. As Cas shuts the door, Dean steps closer to the cage, and yeah, he definitely recognizes its occupant as the vampire from before. The vamp’s wrists, ankles, middle, and neck have all been strapped to a chair, and tons of tubes are attached to him, feeding dead man’s blood into him. There’s no sign that his chest has ever been cut open.

“Hello, Dean Winchester,” the vamp says, and Dean stiffens.

“How do you know my name?”

“I know a lot of things.”

Dean sighs, because he’s in no mood for games. “Quit playing mysterious. I’m not interested.”

“But you are,” the vampire says. “You’re interested in who I am and why I’m here, but more importantly, you are interested in what I have to tell you.”

“And what do you have to tell me?”

“A lot. But while I have near unlimited information, you, unfortunately, have limited time. So I leave it to you to decide which of your questions you want answered.”

“How the hell am I supposed to know which questions to ask?” Dean blurts out.

“Who are you, and what do the demons want with you?” Cas asks.

“Good questions. I am the alpha vampire, and the demons… their object was not clear at first, but I know now that they are attempting to find their way into Purgatory. They’ve been searching for a way in for sixteen years, perhaps longer.”

“But what do they want in Purgatory?” Dean asks. To be honest, he doesn’t even know what it is, really.

“That is a question that I cannot answer,” the alpha vampire replies. “I can tell you that Purgatory is where the souls of all monsters go when they die. My soul will travel there when I pass, as will your companion’s, when his time comes.”

“I don’t get it,” Dean says. “If the demons are already running Hell, why would they go for Purgatory?”

“Whatever their final goal is, the Mother is most displeased,” the alpha says. “But you need not worry yourself, Dean, because she will soon arrive, and she will fix everything.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

But instead of answering, a look of worry crosses the alpha vamp’s face. In the next moment, Cas stiffens at Dean’s side, and before Dean can even ask, the alpha vamp says, “You must make your escape now. There is a door on the opposite end of this room that should take you to some stairs, leading you out of the building.”

“Let’s go,” Cas says, confirming that it is indeed time to hit the road.

“If you could just turn off the poison feeding into my veins, I could buy you some time,” the alpha offers.

Dean moves toward the machine placed up against the back of the cage, hoping that there’ll be a nice and convenient off switch somewhere.

“Dean, I wouldn’t recommend doing that,” Cas says.

But Dean’s already found a plug and unplugged it, turning the mechanism off. Cas thrusts his hands up in the air, exasperated, but heads toward the back exit that the alpha vamp described anyway, and if Cas trusts the vampire enough to take his directions, Dean figures he can’t have screwed up too much by giving the guy a fighting chance.

“Dean—come,” Cas urges from the back door.

They exit the building exactly the way the alpha vamp said they could, and Cas tells Dean to stay put while he goes around to the front. He runs away before Dean can respond, and Dean’s startled that he’s able to run at all when he was shaky on his feet not ten minutes ago. At least it’s dark, Dean thinks, because that means it’s less likely that he’ll be spotted out here.

Dean counts the seconds until Cas gets back, and though he’s only at seventy-something when Cas rolls around in a stolen car, it feels like the guy’s been gone forever.

Reaching across to pop open the passenger door, Cas says, “C’mon, get in. Hurry.”

Dean climbs into the car, and Cas stomps on the gas, taking them out of the parking lot and onto the street. He gets them safely back to the motel, and thank god, Baby’s still right where they left her.

“I’m driving,” Dean says before he realizes that he doesn’t even have his jacket anymore, and the keys to the Impala—and the one to their motel room, for that matter—were in his jacket. “Fuck,” he mutters.

“Just hotwire it,” Cas says. “You can have another key made when we’re safe.”

They get into the car, and Dean gets to work starting the car.

“Are you sure you’re all right to drive? You may not have lost enough blood to die, but it was still a substantial amount,” Cas says.

“I’m fine,” Dean insists, but goddamn it, now that Cas has reminded him, he’s starting to feel a bit dizzy.

“If you say so,” Cas says as the car starts.

Dean pulls out of the motel parking lot, only to find that he has no idea where they’re going, other than _away from here_.

“We need to get John out of the hospital as fast as we can,” Cas supplies.

“Right,” Dean says, nodding. “Fuck, how are we even gonna do that?”

“You can leave that to me,” Cas says. “Just—let me think.”

Dean drives in the direction of the hospital, feeling a low level of panic stirring in his gut. These are demons—monsters he’s never dealt with before—and no matter how much Dad’s talked about them, hearing about them just isn’t the same as facing them in real life.

And holy fuck, Dad is in _Hell_.

“Calm down,” Cas says, grabbing onto the steering wheel.

Dean blinks, startled, and realizes that they were drifting out of the lane. Fortunately, there aren’t any other cars around, and when Dean looks at the clock on the radio, he sees that it’s just past four in the morning.

“Turn right here,” Cas says.

Frowning, Dean does as he’s told, even though this totally isn’t the way to the hospital. He follows Cas’s instructions, parking the car in a quiet neighborhood.

“Cas, what do you think you’re doing?” Dean asks.

“Just wait here,” Cas answers. “You’re clearly suffering from blood loss, and you’re under quite a bit of stress. As your guardian, I cannot allow you to drive anywhere.”

“What, so you led me all the way over here just to swap drivers?” Dean says, eyebrows raised.

“No. I need to retrieve your father,” Cas says, opening his door.

“Wait—Cas, what are you—” Dean tries, but Cas is already stepping out of the car.

“ _Stay here_ ,” he emphasizes before morphing into his tiger form and taking off.

Dean lets his head fall back against his headrest with a sigh. How the hell does Cas intend to pull this off? He’s a freaking _tiger_ , for Christ’s sake. The hospital won’t just hand over a coma patient to a _tiger_.

Checking the pockets of his jeans, Dean finds his wallet and a stick of gum. His cell phone is gone, though, and the keys to the Impala definitely aren’t here, either…

* * *

Dean isn’t really sure how long Cas has been gone, but it’s apparently long enough for Dean to doze off. It’s still dark out when he stirs, awakened by a set of approaching headlights. Rubbing at his eyes, Dean realizes that he already feels a bit better than he did earlier.

And then he groans, because when the headlights turn off, Dean sees that the car that has just parked itself across the street from him is a fucking _ambulance_.

Cas gets out from the driver’s side and crosses the street, opening Dean’s door. “Get out. We’re gonna have to leave the Impala here for a short while.”

“No fucking way we’re leaving my baby here,” Dean protests.

Cas just wraps a hand around Dean’s elbow and tugs, and Dean curses himself for not keeping his seatbelt on, because Cas practically lifts him out of the car, shoving the door closed behind him. “Your father is inside the ambulance, and the equipment necessary to keep him alive won’t fit in your car. I don’t trust you behind the wheel yet, so between the two of us, we can only drive one car. So we’re taking the ambulance.”

“Yeah, because it’s not conspicuous at _all_ ,” Dean grouses, going around to the passenger side of the ambulance.

“We need to go to Bobby’s,” Cas says as he gets into the car.

“In a stolen ambulance? I don’t think we’ll make it past the fucking state lines, Cas.”

Cas starts the car, but he doesn’t shift gears, turning to look at Dean. “Do you have your cell phone?”

“Nope.”

“But… you have spares, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Where are they?”

“Glove compartment of the Impala.”

Cas hops out of the car to retrieve Dean’s backup phones, and he returns a few seconds later with two of them—Dean knows for a fact that he’s got three in there. “Call Bobby,” Cas says, dropping the phones into Dean’s lap before shifting gears and stepping on the gas.

“Cas—”

“We need to find a place, preferably reachable before the sun comes up, where we can get this car painted over,” Cas says.

Dean just stares at Cas for a long moment before picking up one of the phones. “How are you coming up with all this?” he asks, bewildered. As far as Dean knows, Cas has spent his whole life as a tiger in a glass dome—there’s no way he should know how to do any of this.

“I learn quickly,” Cas says, which doesn’t explain _anything_. “Call Bobby.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’m calling him,” Dean says, dialing Bobby’s number and putting the phone to his ear. “God, he’s gonna be pissed. It’s not even 5 AM yet.”

Cas doesn’t respond, but it’s just as well, because Bobby picks up then, and the first thing out of his mouth is, “Do you have any idea what time it is? This had better be good.”

“Uh, hey, Bobby—it’s Dean. And it’s actually pretty bad,” Dean says.

“Of course it is,” Bobby says resignedly. “All right, lay it on me.”

“Cas and I are in West Virginia, in a stolen ambulance, and we need—”

“What’d you go and steal an ambulance for?”

“It’s not as though we _wanted_ to,” Dean says defensively. “We needed to get my dad out of the hospital. It’s a long story, and I’ll tell it to you when we get to your place. But first, we need to get this ambulance repainted. I was hoping you’d be able to help out with that.”

“You’re a goddamn idjit, Dean,” Bobby says, sighing. “All right, gimme a minute.”

“Tell him that we would prefer a location in to the northwest of Hampshire County, if at all possible,” Cas says.

“What? No. He’s got a whole country’s worth of contacts to look through, so if he’s got one for us, we’re taking it,” Dean says.

“Dean, you still there?”

“Yeah,” Dean says into the phone.

“I’ve got someone for you in Kingwood,” Bobby says. “Where in West Virginia are you?”

“Hampshire County,” Dean answers.

“Romney is the name of the city,” Cas supplies.

“Romney,” Dean parrots to Bobby.

“Oh. Should take you about two hours to get there, then. You’re gonna want to take the 50 West, and then—”

“Hold on, let me put you on speaker phone,” Dean says, because Cas is gonna need to know this.

“Speaker phone?” Bobby echoes.

“Yeah, just start over. 50 West, and then?”

“Then the 560 North, and then the 7 West. That should get you to Kingwood. It’s not a big town, so if you roll in and ask anybody for Irv Franklin, they should be able to point you in the right direction.”

“Irv Franklin?” Dean says, just to check.

“Yep, that’s the man you’ll want to see. I’ll give him a call and tell him to expect a boy and his tiger, all right?” Bobby says.

“Oh, about that,” Dean says. “Cas changed for me. So it’s just gonna be two guys.”

“Huh. Well, that’s good news,” Bobby says. “Can he hear me, right now?”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, good. Cas, listen up.”

“I’m listening,” Cas says, stopping at a red light.

“You take care of that boy and his daddy, y’hear?”

“Of course.”

“If anything happens to ‘em, you’ll have me to contend with.”

“I understand,” Cas says.

“All right. Drive safe. I’m gonna be very put out if I went to all the trouble of asking a favor from Irv only to hear that you dumb idjits got yourselves killed in a goddamn car accident.”

“We’ll be fine,” Dean says. “Thanks, Bobby.”

“Yep.”

Bobby hangs up, and Dean puts his phone away. He glares out the window at the passing streetlights, because this fucking _sucks_. Baby’s in some neighborhood in the middle of nowhere, Dad’s comatose in the back of this ambulance, and a tiger is driving the car because Dean’s apparently lost too much blood to be a reliable driver.

“How long does it typically take paint to dry?” Cas asks out of the blue.

“What?”

“On a vehicle, the size of this ambulance.”

“I don’t know, an hour or so,” Dean answers, still looking out the window.

“I could fly back to the Impala and drive it to Irv Franklin’s place, while we’re waiting for him to repaint the ambulance,” Cas offers, turning onto the on-ramp for the 50 West. Dean just grunts, and Cas says, “I don’t think Bobby would mind sending a tow truck to pick up the car from Kingwood.”

“You’re wrong about that. He would definitely mind,” Dean says—he can already hear Bobby complaining about how dumb Dean is.

“But he would do it anyway, wouldn’t he?” Cas points out, and yeah, of course he would.

“Yeah, I guess,” Dean allows.

“Then that’s what we’ll do. You don’t need to worry,” Cas says.

“Yeah, okay. Fine,” Dean says.

It’s silent for a long moment, the thrumming of the car beneath them comforting because it means they’re putting more distance between themselves and those demons. Absently, Dean wonders whether or not the alpha vamp was able to make it out of the facility.

“Hey, Cas,” Dean says eventually.

“Yes?”

“Why wouldn’t you shift, when we first met? Or any time before that?”

Unsurprisingly, Cas sighs and doesn’t answer.

“So you’re still worried about someone watching you, or what?” Dean asks.

“I am worried about exactly that,” Cas says quietly. “Please stop asking. All that matters is that I keep you safe. The rest is secondary.”

Dean sighs and pulls the lever to let his chair recline, because he’s fucking tired. “Fine,” he says, conceding for now.

Straight-out asking obviously isn’t going to work, so he’s gonna have to find another way to make Cas tell him the truth. It’ll be hard, and he’ll probably have to catch Cas off guard, but Dean has a feeling it’s something big, something important.

* * *

About four hours later, Dean is lying down on a small bed, a thick blanket draped over him. Cas got back with the Impala ten minutes ago, and the ambulance is ready to go, but Irv insisted that Dean and Cas get some sleep before hitting the road.

It makes sense, Dean guesses, since Cas essentially made the two-hour trip from Romney to Kingwood twice in a row. Besides, they’ll need to be rested up, because it’s a seventeen, almost eighteen hour drive to Sioux Falls from here, and the last thing they need is for the driver to pass out on the road.

“Irv suggested that you drink this before sleeping,” Cas says, setting a Gatorade bottle down on the nightstand that Dean is facing. Dean hadn’t even heard him entering the room. “I still think water is best for rehydration, though.”

Dean sits up, wincing a little because he may have had time to shower and clean himself off, but the wounds on his torso still hurt like hell, and sitting makes some of the cuts fold over each other. He grabs the bottle and swallows a few mouthfuls before capping it and setting it back down.

“There. Happy?”

“Yes.”

Dean lies back down, shifting to get comfortable on the lumpy pillow. The bed dips then, and Dean sees Cas crawling up next to him. Dean stiffens, because it’s one thing to sleep next to a tiger, but it’s another to lie in bed with a full-grown man.

Dean is still thinking about how to politely tell Cas that he needs his space when Cas’s eyes suddenly meet his, wide and startlingly blue. Dean’s mind blanks for a second, thoughts stalling, and the next thing he knows, his field of vision is filled with tiger stripes. It’s still a bit weird, knowing that there’s a human-shaped guy under all the fur, behind those intense eyes, but it’s better.

“Thanks, Cas,” Dean says belatedly, because he probably should’ve said this when Cas still had a human mouth to answer him with. “For uh, for everything.”

The tiger makes a rumbling, purring sound and lies down, paws next to Dean’s shoulder. He puts his head down on his paws, one large eye still fixed on Dean.

“Sleep, man. You’re gonna need it.”

Cas sniffs, blinks, and then shifts closer, resting his muzzle on Dean’s shoulder. His mouth opens wide in a yawn, exposing two rows of sharp teeth to Dean, and then he closes his mouth with a sigh, tongue darting out to lick his chops.

“You’re like an overgrown housecat,” Dean comments.

Cas just snorts in response and closes his eyes.


	8. Chapter 8

Dean wakes up at about two in the afternoon and rouses Cas. The ambulance looks like any old black truck, and Dean thanks Irv for a job well done. They get on the road, Cas taking the first turn at the wheel because he’s still wary about Dean’s ability to stay on the road.

Six hours in, they swap places because Cas is unaccustomed to driving and wants to stretch his wings for a while. He also checks on John before taking off, just to make sure all the machinery is working correctly. When Dean asks how Cas even knows how to work that kind of stuff, he repeats that bullshit about being a quick learner. It’s not a good time for Dean to question it, so he just files it away for later—god, when it comes to Cas, Dean’s saving a _lot_ of shit for later.

Cas takes over again seven hours later, when Dean is stopping to grab some food at a 7-Eleven. After eating, Dean falls asleep, and when he wakes up, it’s because the ex-ambulance is pulling into the uneven, unpaved lot in front of Singer Salvage Yard.

“Mm—what time is it?” Dean asks, squinting against the light.

“6 AM,” Cas answers as he parks the truck. As soon as the car’s stopped, Cas hops out to stretch.

Dean gets out a bit slower, still wary of the cuts on his chest, and goes toward Bobby’s house to knock on the door. It opens before he can get there, though, and Dean smiles when Sharon appears in the opening.

“Back so soon?” she says, smiling back at him.

“Looks like it,” Dean answers.

But her smile fades as Dean comes closer, and she says, “You’re hurt. What happened?”

“Kind of a long story,” Dean says. “Is Bobby up?”

“He’ll be around in a bit,” Sharon replies.

“I’m already here,” Bobby announces, and Sharon steps aside to let him out the door. He goes straight over to Dean, looking concerned, but Sharon catches his elbow before he can hug Dean.

“He’s injured,” Sharon warns him.

“Thanks,” Dean says.

“What happened to you, boy?”

“Demons,” Cas says, and Dean almost jumps because Cas’s voice came from _right_ behind him.

“Jesus! Make some noise when you’re walking, will you?” Dean complains.

“I assume this is Cas,” Bobby says. “Nice to finally meet you, properly.”

Cas nods. “I’d appreciate it if you could help me move John into the house—it was very difficult to manage on my own at the hospital.”

“Yeah. ‘Course,” Bobby answers. He follows Cas toward the truck, clapping a hand on Dean’s shoulder as he passes. “Sharon, clear out the guest room a little, all right? And get Dean a drink, if he wants anything.”

“I can get it myself,” Dean responds, heading toward the house.

He goes into the kitchen and grabs a beer, watching as Sharon marches upstairs to where the guest room is. Beer in hand, he sits down on the couch and lets out a sigh of relief, because it doesn’t hurt as much when he’s not moving.

Sharon comes downstairs a little while later to help Cas carry Dad up the stairs in his stretcher—it must be nice to have superhuman strength. Bobby directs them into the guest room, and Dean follows after the procession because he wants to at least see the room, if he’s not gonna be allowed to help.

The guest room is way cleaner than Dean remembers, in that he can actually see the floor, and when they’ve set Dad down on the bed, they make a second trip for medical equipment. Dean just sits at Dad’s bedside and wishes he’d wake up, but shit, now that he knows what’s wrong with him, he feels even worse than before, because he’s got no clue how he’s gonna fix this.

About twenty minutes later, the room for Dad is set up, all the machines up and running, and Dean’s surprised by how much equipment Cas managed to steal from the hospital. He’s still left wondering how Cas knew which things were crucial and which could be spared, because Dean’s sure he would have had no clue what to bring and what to leave behind.

“You should probably get some shuteye, Dean,” Bobby says.

“But we haven’t even told you everything that happened yet,” Dean says.

“That can wait.”

“I’m not even sleepy.”

“Still, you need rest,” Bobby says stubbornly. “Cas said that you suffered quite a bit of blood loss. So we’re gonna go downstairs, eat breakfast, and then you’re gonna sleep. Cas over there’s practically dead on his feet already.”

Dean looks over in time to catch Cas blinking particularly hard and shaking his head. “I’m fine,” Cas insists, but it’s obvious he’s just barely staying awake.

“I’ll just sleep, then,” Dean says.

“No,” Cas says. “You haven’t had a proper meal since before our incarceration, and you need nutrition to regain your strength.”

“Dude. Who even uses words like _incarceration?_ ” Dean says.

Cas rolls his eyes and gestures for Sharon and Bobby to exit the room first, and then he herds Dean downstairs. When they get to the kitchen, Bobby makes them sit at the table before going over to make breakfast, but he quickly gets sent to sit with them, because he’s supposedly hopeless at the stove.

Looking between Cas’s droopy eyes and Bobby’s indignant scowl, Dean finds himself smiling, because he finally feels _safe_ , at least for the time being.

* * *

Around eight o’clock that night, Dean, Cas, Bobby, and Sharon sit down to dinner. It’s nothing too fancy, spaghetti and meatballs with steamed broccoli on the side, but it feels significant, the four of them sitting together like this.

They’re quiet for most of the dinner, but when they’re finishing up, Bobby finally speaks up. “I think now’s a good time to start telling me what happened to you in West Virginia,” he says.

“Yeah,” Dean agrees.

“Wouldn’t it be better if we finished eating, first?” Sharon asks.

“I’m finished,” Cas says. “Should I—” he starts, half-standing, but Sharon grabs his arm to stop him.

“That’s fine. I’ll clear the table when we’re all done,” she says.

“Now’s as good a time as any,” Dean says, putting his fork down. He isn’t really sure where to start, so he figures it’d be best to just begin with Dad going to West Virginia. Bobby’s watching him expectantly, so he starts, “Dad was there to investigate some demonic omens.”

Bobby’s expression tightens instantly. “This wasn’t another one of his—”

“It wasn’t just him being paranoid,” Dean says quickly, heading Bobby off. “I was still on the case in Delta when I got a call from Samuel saying that Dad was in the hospital in West Virginia. He was in a coma when we got there, but Samuel insisted that he didn’t know what was wrong, so I went to the place my dad was checking out. Turns out there were demons there.”

“How’d you—” Bobby starts to ask.

“Cas smelled the sulfur,” Dean says. “We got outta there, but they tracked us down, and the demon that did this—” Dean gestures down at himself, “—to me said that Samuel made a deal with a demon to get Mom back, in exchange for Dad’s soul.”

Bobby’s face goes pale, and fuck, that’s a bad sign. A really bad sign.

“Is that—is that possible?” Dean asks.

“Yes,” Bobby answers. “Before the demons vanished, there used to be crossroad demons that made deals. There was even a spell that could be used to summon them, but after the demons all disappeared, the spell stopped working, as far as I know. It’s a bit of a stretch to trade one soul for another without your own soul getting involved in the process, but it sounds possible.”

“Shit,” Dean mutters. “What’ll it take to wake him up again, then?”

“I really don’t know,” Bobby says. “I’ve never heard of anyone reversing a demon deal before, probably because the sons of bitches who made the deals were happy with whatever they got, ‘til the time came for them to pay up.”

“Pay up?”

“Demon deals required human souls,” Bobby explains. “The demon did a favor for the human, and in return, he got to collect the human’s soul at the end of ten years. Your grandfather’s case seems special, though—seems like he paid up front with your dad’s soul.”

“How do we even know that the demon was telling the truth?” Sharon asks. “Did you speak with your grandfather after you found out?”

“No, but—I don’t know, it just sounded so real,” Dean says.

“All right, we need to confirm whether or not Samuel really did make a deal,” Bobby says. “But while we’re finding that out, we should get some research done on demon deals.”

“How are we supposed to find that out?” Dean asks. “I mean, I can’t just call Samuel and ask him.”

“If we find out that your mother is alive, I think that would be pretty good confirmation that Samuel did make the deal,” Cas suggests.

“That makes sense,” Bobby says.

“Okay, so we need to figure out where he’d be keeping her,” Dean says. “He’s been in West Virginia with our dad, and I’m guessing he’d probably want to keep her close…”

“I don’t know anyone else in West Virginia at the moment, but I can give Irv a call. He’s trustworthy,” Bobby says. “I’ll need him to stay at the shop so the towing company can pick up the Impala, but as soon as that’s done with, we’ll have someone there to track Samuel down.”

“Okay,” Dean says.

“But assuming that the deal _is_ real, we’ll need to know how to break it,” Cas says. “So it’d still be a good idea to do some research.”

“I’m guessing we’ll just have to find the demon that holds the contract and force him to break it, or reverse it,” Bobby says.

“Yeah. _Just_ ,” Dean scoffs.

“No one said it was gonna be easy, son,” Bobby says. “Let’s just… finish up our dinner, and then we’ll go into the study, and I’ll pick out some books.”

“That sounds… _so_ exciting.”

* * *

A breeze wakes Dean up, and it takes a second for him to remember that he’s on the couch at Bobby’s, which explains why he’s got a crick in his neck.

It’s colder than it was before, and Dean can still feel a bit of residual warmth along the side of the couch, where Cas was probably curled up earlier. Curious, Dean sits up, looking around the room. He doesn’t see Cas anywhere, but it shouldn’t be anything to worry about—Cas could just be going to the bathroom. But Dean figures he might as well look for the guy—he took a pretty long nap after they got here today, and he could use a walk.

So Dean shrugs his jacket back on and goes outside, heading toward the garage because he thinks he sees some light coming out from under the door.

As he approaches, he hears Cas’s voice, which is strange, because who would he be talking to at his hour, in Bobby’s garage?

“I don’t understand why this is happening,” Cas is saying.

“You have to trust me, Castiel. She’s our mother.”

That sounds a hell of a lot like Sharon. Why is she—is _Castiel_ Cas’s full name? How come Cas hasn’t ever mentioned it before?

“No,” Cas says.

“Not physically, perhaps, but you must know her. You know her voice. I hear it too—we all do.”

A pause. Then, “All… all companions?”

“All of her creations,” Sharon says, and holy crap, that sounds freaky.

“Do… you hear her, even now?” Cas asks hesitantly.

“Well yes, of course.”

There’s another pause, this one longer than the last, and Dean wonders whether or not they’re communicating without words.

“Wait—do you _not_ hear her?” Sharon asks.

“Not in this form, no,” Cas answers. “Everything’s—sharper. Clearer. I don’t… I don’t understand.”

Sharon’s voice suddenly goes a little deeper, more forceful. “Relax, my child,” she says, and even the cadence of her speech has changed. “It will all become clear to you soon. Just trust me, and protect your hunter—we will need him.”

This sends shivers down Dean’s spine, and he steals back into the house as fast as he can, shucking off his jacket and lying back down on the couch. He pulls the jacket back up over his shoulders, heart hammering in his chest.

Who the hell was Cas talking to? Sharon had sounded like her usual self until that last voice, and Dean wonders fleetingly if it’s possible for companions to be possessed by demons. But that’s unlikely, because Sharon said that apparently all companions can hear this thing’s voice, whatever—or whoever—it is. And shit, that’s one of the scariest things Dean’s ever heard of, the potential existence of some big mama monster that is telepathically connected to all companions, and more, from the sound of what Sharon was saying.

Shuddering, Dean wonders what they could possibly want with him.

The alpha vamp said something about “The Mother” just before they left, and it sure sounds like whatever Cas and Sharon were talking about could totally be the same “Mother.” After all, Sharon said something about “all her creations,” right? Shit, the thought that companions and vampires could be related somehow is worrying. What if they’re all telepathically connected to each other? What if that’s how Cas knew where to find the alpha vamp?

But no—Cas said something about not being able to hear “her” when he was in human form. What does that mean? Is Cas really “broken,” as everyone seems so keen to say?

Cas’s refusal to shift has to have had something to do with this Mother, because he definitely said something about someone listening in on him—spying on him.

God, can Dean even trust him? What if he’s taking someone else’s orders? He may have imprinted on Dean, but Dean really doesn’t know how that process works, doesn’t know whether or not compulsion from an outside source can override the genetically engineered obedience of a companion.

Then the door swings open, and Cas’s silhouette appears on the ground. Dean immediately closes his eyes, feigning sleep, and shit, he _hates_ how quietly Cas moves, because he can’t tell where he is.

A moment later, he feels the air shifting a little, and then there’s a wall of heat in front of him, signifying that Cas has settled down next to the couch, back in tiger form again.

Uneasy, it takes a long time for Dean to fall asleep.

* * *

The next morning, Dean’s neck-deep in research when salvation reaches him in the form of his cell phone ringing, and he escapes Bobby’s study to answer. “Hello?”

“Dean?” Samuel says on the other end of the line.

“Oh,” Dean says, a little surprised. “Hi.”

“Do you have any news on John?” Samuel asks.

This needs to be handled carefully. “Uh, no,” Dean says. “I tried to figure out where he was staying, but uh, Bobby called with an emergency, so I’m headed that way right now. Sorry for not letting you know ahead of time—I figured you had everything under control already at the hospital.”

“Oh. That’s all right,” Samuel says.

“Did something happen to Dad?” Dean asks, because it’d probably be a bit suspicious if he didn’t ask.

There’s a moment of hesitation before Samuel answers, “No. No, everything’s fine. I just wanted to check up on you.”

“Well, I’m fine. Thanks for calling to check, though.”

“Yeah. Stay safe, son.”

Dean holds back the slew of accusations on the tip of his tongue and says instead, “Mhmm, I will. Talk to you later, Samuel.”

He hangs up before Samuel has a chance to say anything else, and then he goes back into the study, where Bobby, Cas, and Sharon are sitting with their books. They all look up as he enters, and he summarizes the conversation he just had with his grandfather.

“I’m almost certain we’ll need to start with Samuel to get to your mom,” Sharon says when he’s done.

“Potentially,” Bobby says. “Now that I think about it, it might have made more sense to Samuel to take your mom to someplace she’d be at least a little familiar with.”

“What, you mean Lawrence?” Dean says. “I don’t think—”

“No, probably not Lawrence, but somewhere in Kansas,” Bobby says.

“Why not Lawrence?” Cas asks.

“It’s Dean’s hometown. His mother died when their house burned down,” Bobby explains. “It’s not something people are likely to forget, so it’d be strange if Mary Winchester suddenly showed up in town again.”

“I see,” Cas says, casting a sympathetic look in Dean’s direction.

But Dean can’t hold his gaze for long, still a little shaken by the conversation he heard last night, so he just pushes on, “Okay, so should we check in Kansas first? How are we even supposed to look?”

“I’m not sure,” Bobby says, frowning. “I don’t really know anyone from the area other than John—he’s my contact for problems in Kansas. But you could probably find someone in that journal of his.”

“Well, that’s a dead end,” Dean says. “His journal’s with his stuff, which is probably in some motel room in West Virginia.”

“You didn’t go looking for where he was staying?” Bobby says, eyebrow raised.

“It slipped my mind, okay?”

Bobby sighs and shakes his head. “All right, let me see what I can dig up, then,” he says, pulling open his desk drawer and rummaging through it.

Dean drops into the chair he’d been using before and grabs the book on demonic rites and rituals. “Do you guys have any thoughts on how to track down the demon that made the deal?” he asks.

“Samuel and Alastair appear to be our only leads,” Cas says.

“Alastair?” Bobby echoes, emerging from the depths of his drawer with a phonebook.

“Yeah, Alastair. He was the demon that slashed me up,” Dean says.

“Oh,” Bobby says, frowning. “All right, well… I assume Alastair was the one who told you about the deal that Samuel supposedly made.”

“Yeah,” Dean confirms.

“I think it’s unlikely that Alastair is holding the contract himself,” Cas says. “I was awake for the duration that Dean was…” he pauses, teeth grinding together, and Dean reaches a hand out instinctively, unsure what its purpose is until it lands on the back of Cas’s neck. Cas exhales sharply and says, “What I meant to say is that Alastair looked like a specialist to me, especially taking his commentary into consideration, so I don’t think he would have been in charge of the deal.”

“Okay,” Bobby says, nodding. “But do you think he would know who _was_ in charge of the deal?”

“Potentially,” Cas says, looking at Dean questioningly. “I wasn’t awake when he told Dean about the deal, so I can’t gauge how honest he was being.”

“I thought he was telling the truth,” Dean says.

“But Samuel would know for sure which demon he dealt with, right?” Sharon says.

“Not necessarily,” Bobby says. “It’s not as though crossroad demons ever gave their names. And their appearances wouldn’t help, since they could possess anyone nearby.”

Dean sighs. “Well, shit. Samuel would be able to give us _something_ to work with though, right?”

“Maybe,” Bobby says. “Crossroad demons aren’t exactly thick on the ground these days, so if we do manage to find one, there’s a pretty good likelihood it’s the same one he dealt with.”

“Should we just try a summoning, then?” Dean says.

“You could do that,” Bobby answers, looking down at his desk and seeming to remember that he was about to look through his phonebook. But he’s only just opened it to the first page when one of the wireless phones on the wall starts to ring, and he picks it up. “Yep.”

“Sharon, you guys got any holy water on hand?” Dean asks.

“Sure,” Sharon answers, getting to her feet. “There’s a crossroads not too far from here. I’ll grab some paint for a Devil’s trap, too.”

“Sounds good,” Dean says, following her toward the door. Cas puts down his book and gets up too.

“You guys doing the summoning now?” Bobby asks, coming toward them from the kitchen.

“Yeah, we’ll give it a shot,” Dean answers as Sharon goes to get the holy water.

“Mm. Be careful, then. I’m gonna stay here and hit the books. Friend o’ mine just ran into something both of us ain’t never heard of. Involves blood and fire and virgins and gold and more fire…” Bobby grumbles, shaking his head.

“That’s fine,” Cas says as Bobby crosses the study and sinks into his chair. “It’ll be better if you focus on the case where lives are at stake in the immediate future.”

“You got that right, boy,” Bobby says, setting the phonebook aside and grabbing a huge book from the floor next to his desk.

“Good luck with that,” Dean says as he exits the room. “C’mon, Cas. We’ve got a demon to catch.”

* * *

So the crossroads summoning thing turns out to be a bust, and Dean, Cas, and Sharon return to the house an hour after they left, short a can of spray paint with nothing to show for it. Bobby isn’t surprised at all, saying something about how he’d expected as much.

They spend the rest of the day, well into the evening, buried in books. Bobby insists on having at least one other person help him with the blood, fire, and virgins case, so Sharon switches out her demon book for an encyclopedia of monsters.

Dean and Cas don’t really come up with anything usable on the demon deal front, because it seems like no one’s ever wanted to reverse the deal ‘til their time was up, and by then it was too late to do anything anyway. They did find out that Hellhounds were real, and that they were used by demons to collect on deals, which sounded… gruesome.

After dinner, Bobby goes right back to the study, but Dean’s fried, so he lounges on the couch in front of the TV, channel surfing.

He’s just starting to doze off when there’s a series of loud knocks on the door.

“Dean, can you get that?” Sharon calls from the kitchen, where she’s doing the dishes.

“Yeah, got it!” Dean answers, getting to his feet and walking over to answer the door.

He’s immediately pushed inside by a terrified-looking Chuck, who whirls around as soon as he’s over the threshold and shoves the door closed again, locking it hurriedly.

“Oh, holy crap,” Chuck says, breathing a sigh of relief.

“Dude—” Dean starts, but Chuck jumps practically a foot at the sound of Dean’s voice, and Dean jerks backwards, surprised. Chuck spins to face Dean, eyes wide, and Dean says, slower, “Dude… you okay?”

“Who is it?” Bobby says, and Dean hears his thumping footsteps approaching from the study.

“Uh, Chuck,” Dean answers.

“Yep, just me,” Chuck says, waving nervously at Bobby.

When Chuck doesn’t offer anything else, Dean asks, “So what’s with the uh… hurry?”

“Wha— _oh_. I was on the run,” Chuck says. “I uh, when I got back from West Virginia, I painted a nice, big Devil’s trap on the roof of the lobby of my facility in Iron River, because y’know, better safe than sorry. And this morning, I was just getting to work in the lab when Sera called me on the lab phone and said that there were a couple mean-looking guys trapped under the Devil’s trap, so I—”

“Mean-looking guys,” Dean repeats, eyebrows raised.

“Well, that’s what she told me. I figured they had to be demons because they were trapped, so I got out through the back and drove up toward Canada because I didn’t know if the demons had backup, and if they did, then I’d have to throw them off my track, y’know? And then I—I stole a car and drove it back down here, because John said that I could come here to this address and ask for Bobby in the case of an emergency, and I think—I hope?—that demons are an emergency, so—”

“Yeah,” Bobby says, cutting Chuck off midstream, “demons qualify as an emergency.”

“So I can stay here, right?” Chuck says anxiously.

Bobby sighs. “Yep, but I don’t have a bed for you.”

“That’s fine. I’ll uh, I could sleep on the couch?”

“I’ve been sleeping on this couch, but there’s an armchair in the study. We could switch off,” Dean says.

“Okay,” Chuck says, nodding quickly. “I _really_ didn’t know what to do. Thank you.” Then he frowns and asks, “Wait—Dean, why are _you_ here?” Dean’s scarcely opened his mouth to reply when Cas walks in from the study, and Chuck’s eyes go wide. “Is that—I mean, wait— _is that who I think it is?_ ”

“Jesus, Chuck, calm down,” Dean says, grabbing onto Chuck’s elbow preemptively, because it looks like he might actually pounce on Cas in his haste to examine him.

“How’d you get him to change?” Chuck asks Dean, but he’s unable to take his eyes off Cas.

Cas stares right back, unblinking, and replies for Dean, “He didn’t _get_ me to do anything.”

“Oh, wow. I didn’t think I’d ever get to talk to you,” Chuck says.

“What the hell are they talking about?” Bobby asks, eyes on Dean.

Dean opens his mouth to explain, but hell, he doesn’t even know what exactly the problem with Cas was, and neither did Chuck, last time he checked, so he just says, “Doesn’t matter.” Turning to Chuck, he asks, “Do you have any idea who the demons were?”

“No clue,” Chuck says, finally taking his eyes off Cas. “Oh god, Sera could be dead,” he realizes suddenly, tensing up, and Dean squeezes his arm in a hopefully grounding way, but Chuck still looks terrified.

“Try not to think about that,” Dean says.

“Well what am I supposed to think about instead? The fact that _I_ could be dead right now?”

“Nonsense. I doubt they would have wanted to kill someone as useful as you,” Cas says.

“Yeah, because _that’s_ gonna make him feel better,” Dean says before turning back to Chuck. “Here—let me tell you what Cas and I are doing here.”

“Oh, yeah. That _is_ a pretty big coincidence,” Chuck says.

“Mhmm, and it gets better,” Dean says. “We found my dad in West Virginia, but he was in a coma. Long story short, we think it was a demon deal: my dad’s soul in exchange for my mom’s life.”

Chuck stares at him for a moment, and then he says, “That actually _does_ sound like something your dad would do.”

“Wait—what? No uh, what we think happened is that my grandpa made the deal,” Dean says.

“Your grandpa?” Chuck says, frowning.

“Yeah. He’s Samuel Campbell, in case you didn’t know.”

“ _Oh_. Oh, that makes a lot more sense. Your dad always sounded like he was more hell-bent on revenge, not resurrection,” Chuck says. After a pause, he asks, “Where uh, where is he, now?”

“Just upstairs,” Dean says. “We moved him here after getting away from the demons—they got a hold of me and Cas, but we got out.”

“Can I see him?”

“Sure,” Dean says, glancing in Bobby’s direction just to double check.

“Yeah, go on ahead,” Bobby says. “I’m gonna get back to work. You know where to find me.”

“Okay. C’mon,” Dean says, heading up the stairs. Chuck follows, and when Dean looks back over his shoulder, he sees Cas coming up as well. They go over to the room, and Dean has to brace himself a little before going inside because he still doesn’t like seeing his dad hooked up to those machines like that.

“Oh, god. I never should have called,” Chuck says when they’re all in the room. “He was there because of the tip I gave you, right? Oh, this is all my fault.”

“It was the demons, Chuck, not you,” Dean says. “Besides, we’re hunters. We know the risks of the job.”

“Yeah. Yeah, I guess,” Chuck says. He shakes his head, rubbing a hand over his mouth and chin. “God, but he’s… I’m not used to seeing him like this.”

“Yeah, I get that.”

“I’m sorry. Shit, I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Dean says. “Look, you wouldn’t happen to know anything about demon deals, would you?”

“Uh, no. No, I don’t. Sorry,” Chuck says.

“That’s all right. It was a long shot, anyway,” Dean says.

They go back downstairs after a while, and Dean resumes his seat on the couch, this time making enough room for Chuck. Cas returns to the study, and Dean catches Chuck’s eyes following him.

“You’re really curious about him, aren’t you?”

“You bet I am,” Chuck says, sounding a lot calmer now. “He’s a stunning creature.”

“Uh… right,” Dean says, because it’s weird to hear Chuck talking about Cas like that when he’s man-shaped. “Hey, listen,” he says, lowering his voice, “you wouldn’t happen to know anything about companions uh… teleporting, would you?”

Chuck bursts into laughter at that, and Dean chuckles a little, but the rapid transition in his mood is startling and more than a little off-putting. “That’s a good one, Dean,” Chuck says, still smiling.

“Yeah,” Dean says, and he figures that that was enough of an answer to his question. “Yeah, because that was a joke.”

Fortunately, Chuck doesn’t seem to notice Dean’s tone, turning his attention to the TV.

“Dean,” Cas says, and Dean feels his heart leap into his throat, startled.

“One of these days, you’re gonna give me a heart attack,” he grouses, turning to see Cas standing in the entryway between the study and the TV room.

“Bobby called one of your father’s old friends in Lawrence. She’ll hopefully have an answer for us by tomorrow,” Cas reports.

“That fast?” Dean asks.

“She’s supposedly a psychic,” Cas says, but the look on his face makes it plain just how much he believes that. Dean’s never really believed psychics in general, but he knows that there are some people who are more attuned to the supernatural, and if Dad thought of her as a friend, that’s good enough for Dean.

“What do you guys need with a psychic?” Chuck asks.

“We’re just uh, fact-checking,” Dean says, “to make sure our theory about Samuel is right. If we’re right, then my mom’s gotta be hidden away somewhere, y’know? And we figured, if she’s not in West Virginia with Samuel, then he might have her somewhere near our hometown.”

“Oh. What’re you gonna do to your grandpa if you find out that he really traded your dad for your mom?”

“I… really don’t know,” Dean confesses.

He can’t imagine killing Samuel, because if it turns out he did make the deal, then he did it out of love. In the end, he’s still blood, and Mom wouldn’t want to see her father killed by her own son. But fuck, Dean can’t imagine _forgiving_ Samuel either, because if he made the deal, then he pretty much singlehandedly sent Dad to Hell.

So he adds, quietly, “I guess we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it.”


End file.
